Demigods at Hogwarts
by DemigodWitchTribute8
Summary: A few weeks after the giant war, Percy Jackson, Annabeth Chase and Nico di Angelo must travel to Hogwarts to help Harry Potter destroy Voldemort. But, they must do this without revealing their identities to the witches and wizards. Rated T because I'm paranoid.
1. Chapter 1

**Hey, this is my first story so sorry for any mistakes or anything. I will hopefully get better the more fanfics I do. I hope u like this story. By the way, I have updated all of these chapters to make them smoother and I cut out an OC.**

 **Disclaimer: All characters are owned by Rick Riordan.**

 **Enjoy…**

* * *

 **Percy POV**

It was two weeks after the giant war had ended and things were getting back to normal. Though the demigods were still getting over the losses they had suffered during the war.

Chiron had allowed Annabeth to stay in the Poseidon cabin so that Percy and Annabeth could comfort each other when they had nightmares about Tartarus. This was why, when Percy woke to find Annabeth nowhere in sight, he had a moment of panic. After a second, he realised that she must have already gone to breakfast. Percy got up and started getting dressed and headed out to the dining pavilion. When he got there Annabeth wasn't there, but he saw Will Solace and Nico di Angelo sitting together nearby. Will with his arm around Nico and, as Percy made his way over to them, Will planted a kiss on the son of Hades' cheek. They didn't notice Percy walking up behind them. "Enjoying yourself, Death Breath?" he said with a smirk.

Nico turned around quickly to glare at Percy. "Shut up, Kelp Head."

"Whatever, Zombie Boy." Percy rolled his eyes. "Have either of you seen Annabeth?" Percy asked them more seriously.

"She's training, last I saw," Will answered.

"Thanks," Percy said as he started running towards the training arena. He slowed down as he reached it and walked in to see Annabeth hacking away at a training dummy. Percy stood there watching her for a minute. Eventually, Annabeth noticed him and smiled. "Hey, Seaweed Brain," she said as she made her way over to him.

* * *

A week or so later, while Percy and Annabeth were having breakfast, Will ran up to them from the direction of the Big House. "Hey guys, Chiron wants you to meet at Rachel's cave, as well as Nico," he said as he stopped in front of them.

"Ok. Thanks, Will," Annabeth replied as they got up and headed towards the Hades cabin to get the son of Hades. Percy knocked on the door and they heard movement inside. Nico opened the door.

"Hey, what's up?" he asked.

"Chiron wants you to come to Rachel's cave," answered Annabeth.

Nico frowned. "Why?"

"We don't know yet."

"Ok, let's go," he said.

Percy turned around and lead them over to the cave in which the Oracle of Delphi had been staying.

As they walked inside, the cave, as usual, was decorated with paintings and artworks that Rachel had done. Percy saw that she had recently added some more to her collection. Rachel was sitting on a couch sketching something on a notebook when she looked up at the sound of their footsteps. She closed her notebook and stood up to greet them.

"Hey guys," she said. They all greeted her in return.

Once they were all sitting down Chiron started talking.

"Thank you all for coming. Rachel just gave us another prophecy." The demigods groaned. "Now, I know that we are only just recovering from the war with the giants and Gaia, but you three must go on a quest" Cue, more groans from the demigods.

"What was the prophecy?" Annabeth asked.

" _The greatest half-blood to ever live,  
Shall journey to find the boy who lived,  
Crow and owl guide the way,  
To find the place where wizards lay,  
The darkness there must not be named,  
Sons of prophecy prove its bane._"

"Can't me and Annabeth have a break from quests for a bit?" complained Percy.

"You heard the prophecy, it has to be you," answered Chiron.

"What does the prophecy mean? What is this quest?" asked Arya.

"I believe that you must travel to Britain, to a part of the world that is filled with followers of Hecate, to a school. _To find the place where wizards lay."_

"Seriously, I have to go on a quest to a school. Can this get any worse?" Percy complained.

"Be quiet, Seaweed Brain. Let Chiron finish," Annabeth said.

"As I was saying, you will go to this school full of followers of Hecate, you will have to blend in with them. Therefore, Hecate will soon come and bless each of you. This will allow you to blend in more easily with the witches and wizards. You will also receive wands," Chiron said.

"What about the rest of the prophecy? asked Nico.

"Well, _the greatest half-blood to ever live_ , that could be any of you. You all have proven yourselves to be some of the best heroes of our age. Though I suspect that it is you, Percy," Chiron answered. Percy frowned at that. He wasn't that great, all he had done was defeat Kronos, and survive two wars and… Tartarus. A shiver went through him as he thought of it.

"What about the next line, about journeying to find the 'boy who lived'? I'm a boy and I'm alive, does that make me the boy who lived as well?" asked Nico.

"That is a name given to Harry Potter, a young follower of Hecate after he survived the killing curse when he was young. Apparently, he is the only one in history to have survived it," said Chiron.

"So, we have to go to this Harry Potter and then, _crow and owl guide the way_?" Percy said.

'Well, owls are the symbol of Athena, so that may mean Annabeth, crows can be a symbol of Hades, so that might refer to you," Chiron said pointing to Nico. "And the next line must be about you going to Britain where wizards live."

As he said that a bright light filled the cave, and a moment later Hecate appeared in the middle of the room. They all bowed in greeting to her.

"Greetings demigods, Oracle and Chiron," she said.

"Thank you, Lady Hecate for coming," said Chiron. She nodded in response.

"Now, onto the reason I am here. I assume you told them what I will do," she asked Chiron. He nodded. Then, three balls of light came out of her and headed to the demigods. They went into their chests and Percy felt a new power in him. He looked around and saw that the others were just as amazed as he was.

"Now, your wands," Hecate continued.

"Wands?" asked Percy.

"Indeed. My followers use wands to control their magic, as they are not as powerful as my children. Now," she pulled out three wands and started handing them out, first going to Annabeth. "Beechwood, owl feather core, 11 ¼ inches," she said as she gave it to her.

Then she moved onto Percy. "Blackthorn wood, hippocampus tail hair core, 12 ½ inches," Hecate said as she handed Percy the wand. He felt the power in the wand as he grabbed it.

Hecate moved on to Nico. "Ebony wood, bone core, 10 inches." She handed him the wand.

Hecate then disappeared in a blaze of light. When she was gone there was silence, the three demigods were studying their wands with interest.

"Ok, you three should go and start packing. You'll leave tomorrow noon," Chiron said. The demigods started out of the cave towards their cabins.

* * *

The three demigods stood on top of the hill next to Thalia's Pine Tree. They had just finished saying goodbye to everyone, and Nico was getting ready to shadow travel all the way to Britain.

"Ready?" said Nico, interrupting Percy's thoughts. He and Annabeth nodded.

"Remember, be careful and don't reveal your identity," Chiron called to them as they grabbed each other's hands and ran at the shadow of Thalia's Pine.

Percy felt the shadows close around him and for a second it was only darkness. Then they emerged in a park. Nico swayed and Percy tried to help steady him, but Nico pushed him away. "I'm fine," he muttered. When Percy looked around, he saw that the shadows around them were long and it took him a moment to remember that Britain's time was 5 hours ahead, so it was around 6:00 pm. They walked out of the park and towards a row of dark buildings. They saw a man standing in front of one. He had one wooden leg, an electric blue eye that looked like it was magical and there was a large chunk taken out of his nose.

He saw them and beckoned them over. They walked cautiously over to him.

"You must be the American exchange students," the man said in a rough voice. They all nodded. "I'm Alastor Moody. I've been sent to collect you."

"Who sent you?" asked Annabeth.

Moody said. "Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts, sent me."

"Where are we staying?" Percy asked him. Moody beckoned them to follow him towards one of the buildings.

"For the next two nights, you will be staying at the Leaky Cauldron, and you'll be off to Hogwarts the day after tomorrow." He gestured for them to come and he opened the door to the building and went inside. They followed him inside the building, which looked to be a pub. Many people were bustling about with drinks and dinner.

Moody walked up to the bar, where a man was standing cleaning a glass. "Tom," Moody said gruffly. "Can we get a room for three." He passed the man some strange looking coins, which he picked up and counted before nodding.

"Of course. Follow me." The man, Tom, lead them up some stairs and along a hallway. He opened a door and showed them inside. "Come down again when you're ready for dinner," he said before nodding again and leaving.

"You'll find your school supplies for this year are in those," Moody said, pointing to three suitcases sitting by the beds. "Tomorrow you can explore Diagon Alley. Just ask Tom to let you through. The next day I will pick you up at 10 o'clock to take you to Hogwarts, understood?" The demigods nodded. "Good." It was Moody's turn to nod as he walked out the door, closing it behind him.

The demigods settled down, Nico on a single bed, while Annabeth and Percy shared the double. Percy opened his suitcase to see an assortment of books, strange robes, vials of weird substance and various other things.

* * *

 **I hope you liked that. It was kind of a boring ending and the story is moving pretty quickly but whatever. We'll be off to Hogwarts in the next chapter, yay!**

 **I'll try to post weekly most of the time, but I'm sorry if I don't keep to that schedule.**

 **I know, I know, some of those wand cores don't exist. But, these work for the characters. So, too bad. I tried to match up the woods as well as I could though.**

 **Anyway, sorry for any mistakes.**

 **Please review.**

 **See you next week.**


	2. Chapter 2

**Hey, guys.**

 **Disclaimer: Rick Riordan and J.K Rowling own all of it.**

 **Enjoy…**

* * *

 **Nico POV**

The next morning, Nico was woken by a light shake on his shoulder. He summoned his sword and had brought it into a defensive position even before he had opened his eyes. When he did open his eyes, he saw Percy standing in front of him, hands up in surrender, hair still messed up from sleep.

"Woah, there, Neeks," Percy said with a smirk. Nico glared at him before dropping his sword and muttering an apology. As he put his sword away, he looked around the rest of the room. The door to the bathroom was closed, so Nico presumed that Annabeth was in there. Nico got up and started getting dressed, Percy followed suit. When all three demigods were ready, they headed downstairs with money pouches that they had found in the suitcases that Moody had left them.

Once they had finished breakfast they walked over to Tom the bartender and asked him about Diagon Alley. He led them out the back door and into a small, mostly empty courtyard. Tom took out his wand and tapped the wall three times with it. A hole appeared as the bricks moved to create an archway that led onto a cobbled street lined by a variety of strange shops. Tom gestured them forward and, once all three demigods had stepped through the archway, the bricks moved back to form a solid wall.

As they started walking, Nico looked around at the shops that lined the street. There were shops selling owls, cauldrons, books, robes and other strange items. Percy had started walking towards one of the shops, dragging Annabeth behind him. As Nico followed them, he noticed where they were headed: Florean Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlour. Nico rolled his eyes as they arrived at the store. Five minutes later, they continued walking with their ice creams.

Annabeth drew them over to a book shop called Flourish and Blotts. Reluctantly, the boys followed her inside. They stayed in the shop for nearly an hour before the boys dragged Annabeth, whose arms were loaded with books, outside.

They continued exploring, looking around various shops before they ended up in the "Magical Menagerie", which was the home of an assortment of animals. There were various breeds of owls, cats, toads, rats and a cage full of small balls of fluff. As Nico walked in, all the animals nearest to him moved away, making various sounds of disgust. A second later, Nico's vision was obscured by black fur as a small black cat jumped onto him, hooking its claws into his jacket. He glared at it as it climbed up onto his shoulder and sat there, looking at him with large dark eyes. He tried to shoo it off but it wouldn't budge.

"Looks like you've found a friend, Death Breathe," Percy said, smirking. Nico glared at him before sighing and taking out his money pouch. He walked up to the counter.

"How much for the cat?" he asked the man behind the counter.

"8 galleons, but for 10 you'll get supplies that will last around a year," the man replied.

Nico fished around in his pouch for the right coins (Moody had left a note explaining what each was called and how much they were worth). He handed over the coins and accepted the bag of supplies. Annabeth took his place at the counter with a large barn owl. She, too, paid for the owl and the supplies. They left the shop.

"I knew you had a heart in there somewhere," Percy teased.

"Shut up, Water Boy."

"What are you gonna call it?"

"'It' is a girl," corrected Nico. After a moment of thought, Nico knew what he was gonna call her. "Bianca." Percy nodded sadly and looked over to Annabeth questioningly.

"Andreas," Annabeth answered Percy's silent question, giving the owl on her shoulder a pat on his head.

They continued exploring Diagon Alley for the rest of the day, before heading back to the Leaky Cauldron.

* * *

They arrived at Kings Cross Station at around 10:30 the next morning. Apparently, they had to get to platform 9 ¾. Nico didn't even know that was a thing. Moody led them to the wall between platform 9 and 10.

"Just run straight at that wall and you'll be on the platform," Moody told them.

"You want us to run at a wall?" Percy asked in disbelief.

"Yes, off you go," he said gesturing for them to go. The demigods glanced at each other in disbelief. Eventually, Annabeth stepped forward and started running and, instead of hitting the wall, she went through it. The other to stared at where the daughter of Athena had just disappeared. After a moment, Percy followed his girlfriend, then Nico went through last. He closing his eyes, bracing for impact. However, it never came. He opened his eyes and looked around him. His eyes fell on the large, scarlet train, which the others were also gazing at it. The demigods followed the hoards of students onto the train.

They walked along the train, looking for an empty compartment. Eventually, they found one that only had four people in it. The first person was a girl who had straggly, waist-length, dirty blonde hair, and protuberant eyes. The second was a round-faced boy with blonde hair. The third had perpetually untidy black hair, bright emerald-green eyes behind round glasses, and a lightning bolt-shaped scar on his forehead. The last was a girl with flaming red hair and a freckled complexion. They looked up as the demigods came into the compartment.

"Um.. hello, do you mind if we sit with you, everywhere else is full," Annabeth asked the occupants of the compartment.

"Of course not," answered the round-faced boy. Once the demigods were all seated, the boy spoke again, "I'm Neville, by the way. That's Luna," he pointed to the blonde girl, "Ginny," he motioned towards the redhead, "and Harry Potter." The demigods exchanged a look. So this was the boy they had to protect. "So who are you guys? I've never seen you before," the first boy, Neville, asked.

"We're American exchange students," said Percy. "I'm Percy, that's Annabeth and Nico."

"Oh, right we got a letter about that," Ginny said. "So, what made you want to come to Hogwarts?"

"The education here is better," Annabeth answered. They continued talking about various things, comparing Britain to America and other stuff that Nico didn't really care about. He tuned out and instead stared out the window as he pet Bianca.

Nearly an hour later, the door opened to show to people standing in the doorway. The first was a girl with frizzy, untamable dark hair and brown eyes. The second was a boy that looked a lot like Ginny, with his bright red hair and freckles. The boy frowned as the two sat down.

"Who are you?" he asked.

"I'm Annabeth, and this is Nico and Percy. We're the American exchange students."

"I'm Hermione and that's Ron," said the girl.

"Guess who's Slytherin prefect," said Ron turning to the others. Nico had no idea what a 'prefect' was, but he figured he'd find out eventually.

"Malfoy?" said Harry.

"Yeah, and Pansy Parkinson," Hermione said.

"I don't know what the teachers were thinking when they decided that those two would make good prefects," Ron said.

"Well, there's not many Slytherins who are any good," Harry said.

"Well, there are a few," said Hermione. "But Malfoy is definitely one of the worst." They continued talking about different things that Nico once again tuned out of. Then they started talking about the different houses.

"Are you three going to be sorted?" Hermione asked the demigods.

"I think so, though I don't think Ch- um… Professor Chiron said anything about that," Annabeth said.

"What houses do you want to be sorted into?" asked Ginny.

"Houses?" questioned Annabeth.

"Everyone gets sorted into one of four houses in their first year. There's Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff and Slytherin," said Hermione. "Most of us are Gryffindor, except Luna, who's in Ravenclaw. You're sorted according to your personality. Gryffindors are brave, loyal and courageous. Ravenclaws are wise, intelligent and creative. Hufflepuffs are hardworking, loyal and value fair play. Slytherins are cunning, resourceful and ambitious."

"There's not a bad wizard alive who wasn't in Slytherin," added Ron.

"Well, except Wormtail," said Harry. Ron nodded in agreement.

"So, what house do you guys think you'll be in?" asked Ginny.

"Well," said Annabeth, thinking aloud, "Based on those values, Percy's probably a Gryffindor, Nico could be in Gryffindor or Slytherin and I'll probably either in Gryffindor or Ravenclaw."

"Why would you be in Slytherin? I mean, only evil people are in Slytherin," said Ron.

"Why would being in Slytherin make me evil," said Nico. "Those values don't necessarily mean that your evil."

"All the bad wizards were in Slytherin," Harry said.

"So what, a few Slytherins were bad. How does that make all Slytherins bad? They're not all gonna be the same," said Nico. Just then the door opened to a boy with platinum blond hair and a pale, pointed, sneering face, flanked by two larger boys.

"Well, well, well, Potter," the boy spat out the last word. "Found some new friends have you?'

"Go away, Malfoy," Harry said.

"Not just yet," he said. He looked around at the three Americans. His eyes settled on Nico last and stayed there a second longer. "I'm Malfoy. Draco Malfoy. And I'm guessing that you're the American exchange students." The three demigods nodded. "You might want to reconsider who you want to be friends with."

"I don't think we do," said Annabeth. Draco glared at her

"Whatever," he said. "Your loss." He looked at Nico one last time before turning and walking away, closing the door behind him. The others sat there glaring at the spot where Malfoy had been, but Nico had seen the way Malfoy looked at him and felt unnerved by it.

The others eventually went back to talking, but Nico sat there silently staring out the window. Then he remembered that he should probably Iris message Chiron to tell him how things were going, and maybe he could talk to Will as well. He stood up and walked towards the door. Bianca meowed unhappily as she was forced off his lap. Then, she jumped back up onto Nico's seat and curled up.

"Where are you going?" asked Percy.

"To the toilet, if that's alright with you," he snapped. He didn't mean to be that rude, but he still couldn't help being a little edgy around his former crush.

Percy put his hands up in surrender. "OK, no need to snap at me, Neeks."

"Don't call me that."

"Will does."

"And I tell him not to." Nico walked out and headed towards the toilets.

He went into the bathroom and turned on the tap. He doubted it would work but it was worth a try. Turns out he was having a lucky day as a faint rainbow appeared in the water. He threw in a golden drachma and spoke quietly. "Oh Iris, goddess of the Rainbow, please accept my offering. Chiron at Camp Half-Blood." The water shimmered, then Chiron appeared in the water. He was in his office in the Big House. He was sitting in his magical wheelchair.

"Nico," he said as he noticed the son of Hades. "I didn't expect you to contact so soon."

"I thought I might not get a chance once we get to Hogwarts," he replied. He nodded in agreement.

"How is the quest going?" he asked.

"It's going alright. They don't seem suspicious of us, which is a good sign," said Nico. "They think that we're just regular American witches and wizards."

"Good," he replied. "Anything else of interest?"

"No, not really. Is Will busy?"

"I'm sure he can make time for you." Chiron eyes twinkled as he said this. "I can go find him for you. Good luck on your quest," he said as he walked away. After a few minutes, Will came running up, smiling as usual.

"Hey, Neeks. How's the quest going? I miss you already," the son of Apollo said.

"Don't call me that," Nico mumbled. "It's going alright, not much has happened yet. I miss you too. I hope this quest doesn't take too long, but Chiron made it sound like it would take the whole school year."

"It better not. Will you be back for Christmas?"

"I don't know, probably. They should have a Christmas holiday. If not I'll shadow-travel back there anyway."

Will shook his head. "Be careful with your powers, you don't want to get that close to fading again."

"I know, I know." The couple continued talking for a while before Nico decided that he should probably get back so as not to arouse suspicion.

Nico turned off the water, walked out of the bathroom and headed back to their compartment. Little did he know, someone was listening to his entire conversation.

* * *

 **I hope you liked that.**

 **Please review.**

 **See you next week.**


	3. Chapter 3

**Hey guys.**

 **A/N is at the end**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own anything.**

 **Enjoy…**

* * *

 **Harry POV**

Harry watched as Nico walked out of the compartment. He waited a minute before going out himself. He was sitting next to the door, so no one really noticed him leave, and if they did, they didn't say anything. Despite the Americans friendliness, there was something about them that wasn't right. He followed Nico to the bathrooms, so he was telling the truth about that.

Harry put his ear to the door and listened. He could hear running water. Then he heard her talking. "Oh Iris, goddess of the Rainbow, please accept my offering. Chiron at Camp Half-Blood." _Camp Half-Blood? What's that? And who's Iris?_

Then he heard a man's voice say, "Nico, I didn't expect you to contact so soon."

"I thought I might not get a chance once we get to Hogwarts," Nico's voice replied.

"How is the quest going?" the man asked. _Quest? What are they talking about?_

"It's going alright. They don't seem suspicious of us, which is a good sign," said Nico. "They think that we're just regular American witches and wizards."

 _So, I was right. There is something different about them._

"Good," the man replied. "Anything else of interest?"

"No, not really. Is Will busy?" Harry heard Nico reply. _Who's Will? Percy mentioned him back at the compartment._

"I'm sure he can make time for you," the man, Chiron, replied. "I can go find him for you. Good luck on your quest."

After a few minutes, a new voice spoke, presumably Will. "Hey, Neeks. How's the quest going? I miss you already."

"Don't call me that," Nico mumbled. "It's going alright, not much has happened yet. I miss you too. I hope this quest doesn't take too long, but Chiron made it sound like it would take the whole school year."

"It better not. Will you be back for Christmas?"

"I don't know, probably. They should have a Christmas holiday. If not I'll shadow-travel back there anyway." _What's shadow-travel? It sounds like dark magic._

"Be careful with your powers, you don't want to get that close to fading again." _Fading? Again?_

"I know, I know."

"I had to sleep in my own cabin because Chiron wouldn't let me stay in yours without you," Will said. _What?_

Harry heard Nico sigh, exasperated. "Whatever. I don't know what I'm gonna do without you. You're the only one keeping me sane with all the nightmares."

"You'll be fine. IM me if you need me, even if it's in the middle of the night. Or can get Percy or Annabeth if you need to, they get nightmares too." _Why do they all get nightmares? What happened to them?_

Nico let out a short, humourless laugh. "No way am I going to Percy, I only just got over him." _What? What does that mean?_ "At least they have each other."

"Percy would be fine with it, he's very protective of you… in, you know, a brotherly sort of way."

"Yeah, great, thanks." Nico's voice was bitter. Harry heard him sigh again. "I better get back. I'll IM you later."

"Alright, bye. Love you." Harry stood in shock.

"I-I love you too," Nico replied quietly. Harry was frozen in place as Nico exited the bathroom and made his way back to the compartment.

 _What did I just hear? Who are they? What are they up to? Who is Will?_ These thoughts swirled through Harry's head as he headed back down the train.

* * *

 **Percy POV**

They got off the train and headed towards the carriages. As they got closer the demigods noticed that the carriages were pulled by black, skeletal winged horses.

"Hey, what are those," Percy asked.

"What do you mean?" Hermione said.

"The things pulling the carriages," replied Percy. She looked at him confused.

"I can see them too," said Harry.

"Why have you never seen them before then?" Ron asked Harry. He shrugged.

They had gotten closer now and the skeletal horses had noticed them. They bowed to Percy and Nico. The two demigods glanced at each other.

"Why are they bowing to you two?" Harry asked. Their eyes widened. They exchanged another look, then Percy shrugged, and stepped up into the carriage. Annabeth, Nico, Harry, Ron and Hermione followed while Ginny, Luna and Neville went to a different carriage. The carriage started moving. Harry kept sneaking suspicious glances at Nico, who returned them with a glare. As they got closer to Hogwarts, the demigods admired the castle, especially Annabeth.

"Look at the architecture," she whispered. "It's absolutely amazing."

The carriage stopped, and they got out and started walking to the castle. When they got inside, they saw it was just as beautiful on the inside as it was on the outside. A tall, severe-looking woman walked up to them.

"Good evening," she said. "I am Professor McGonagall. You three need to come with me." They glanced at each other, then followed her through the castle. They stopped behind the first years. "You will be sorted after the first years. After the feast, you are to meet me here." They all nodded, and she walked to the front of the kids. "Follow me." She turned and walked through a large doorway.

As they walked into the room, they were, once again, taken aback by the magnificence of it. Percy glanced up at the roof and saw that it had been enchanted to show the sky above. He looked around and saw the rest of the school's eyes on them. The students were seated at four tables that ran up the length of the hall. Percy looked to the front and saw a table where the teachers were seated.

They stopped, and Professor McGonagall set out a stool, and on it, an old hat. She pulled out a list and called out a name. One of the first years walked up and sat on the stool, McGonagall put the hat on their head. After a few moments, the hat shouted, out of a rip in its brim, "HUFFLEPUFF!" The student took the hat off and headed towards a table decorated with yellow and black. It continued like this until only the demigods were left.

 **Annabeth POV**

The last first year had been sorted. It was their turn.

"Chase, Annabeth"

As her name was called, she walked up and sat on the stool. Then she heard the hat talking inside her head.

 _Hmm… Interesting… A demigod… Daughter of Athena… Brilliant mind… You'd make a good Ravenclaw… Or perhaps a Gryffindor… Hmmm… Difficult… Ravenclaw or Gryffindor… Very difficult… Better make it… RAVENCLAW!_

It shouted out the last word. Annabeth was on the brink of tears. The hat had gone into all her memories, including the ones from Tartarus. She quickly got up and headed towards the table decorated with blue and bronze. She was sure that those around her noticed the tears in her eyes. They casting her questioning looks.

 **Nico POV**

"Di Angelo, Nico."

Nico walked up and sat down, the hat was placed on his head.

 _Hmm… Yet another demigod…_

When he heard the voice in his mind he immediately tensed. He hated when someone got inside his head.

 _Do not close off your mind or I will not be able to sort you… I won't go too deep, but I need to see something…_

Nico hesitantly let the thing into his mind.

 _Hmm… Yes… Yes… Very brave… Not a bad mind… Hmm… Son of Hades… Let's see… AHHH!_ The scream was audible to everyone in the Great Hall.

 _SLYTHERIN! SLYTHERIN!_ It called it out to everyone. Nico saw that the hat was slightly shaking. He quickly went to the table with green and silver, keeping the tears from reaching his eyes. He ignored the stares of everyone else and was relieved when McGonagall called the next name.

 **Percy POV**

Oh, Gods. She called Percy's name and he walked up and sat down on the stool. The hat was placed on his head.

 _Hmm… Another demigod… Son of Poseidon ehh… Yes, very brave, very loyal… What else is there? Hmm… Interesting… AHHHH! NO! NO! GRYFFINDOR!_ It screamed out the last words.

The hat jumped off Percy's head and into McGonagall's arms. Percy saw that it was visibly shaking. He, just like Annabeth, was on the brink of tears. He headed over to the Gryffindor table and sat down next to Harry. He glanced worriedly at Annabeth at the Ravenclaw table, she had tears in her eyes and he longed to go comfort her.

Hermione looked like she was about to ask him something when a tall, thin man, with silver hair and beard and a very long and crooked nose, stood up. He welcomed the Americans and then the table was full of all sorts of dishes.

 **Nico POV**

After the sorting incident, not many people talked to Nico. They could see that the same was happening to Percy and Annabeth. Nico was picking at the food in front of him when someone slid next to him.

"Hey," said Malfoy. Nico looked up. "I'm sorry about how I acted on the train earlier." Nico could tell that apologising, and just being nice, was new to him. He looked at Malfoy curiously. "I told you my name, but you never told me yours."

"Nico," he said sceptically. Malfoy smiled.

"Nice to meet you, Nico," Malfoy said.

"So, what's your blood type?" asked Malfoy. The son of Hades paled slightly.

"What do you mean?" Nico asked.

"Are you a pureblood, half-blood or mudblood?" he explained.

"Half-blood," Nico said cautiously. Malfoy frowned for a second, then shrugged.

"Do you know why the sorting hat was so freaked out when it was put on your head?" He asked

"It looked at my memories," Nico said.

"What could be so bad that it made the hat scream like that?"

"I don't like to talk about it," Nico said as he went back to picking at his food.

"Sorry," said Malfoy. Once again, he sounded unfamiliar with the word.

* * *

The three demigods met outside the Great Hall and waited for McGonagall. A few minutes passed before she got there. She gestured for them to follow her and, once again, she led them through the castle. Eventually, they stopped in front of a gargoyle.

"Fizzing Whizbee," said McGonagall. The gargoyle stepped out of the way, revealing a staircase. They followed her up the staircase until they came to a door. McGonagall knocked.

"Come in," they heard Dumbledore say.

McGonagall opened the door and they all walked in. "Thank you, Minerva." He gestured for her to leave. Then he turned to the Americans. "Good evening." They all returned the greeting. "Have a seat." Three comfortable looking chairs appeared in front of Dumbledore's desk. They all sat down.

"Now, I thought it would be best if we had a talk before anything else. First of all, only a few of the staff members know your identity, and Chiron wants to keep it that way," said Dumbledore. The demigods nodded. "Only Professor McGonagall, Professor Snape and I know that you are demigods. I think it would be best if neither my students or any other staff member, discovered that the gods existed and that you're their children." They nodded in agreement.

"I believe your quest is to help Harry take down Voldemort," he continued.

"Yes," said Annabeth.

"You have been blessed by Hecate and given wands?" Dumbledore asked. They nodded. "Despite being all different ages, you will all join the fifth years in their classes."

"Why fifth year?" Percy asked.

"That is the year that Harry is in," Dumbledore answered. They nodded in understanding. "Very well then, Percy, Professor McGonagall will take you to the Gryffindor Common Room, Annabeth, I will show you to the Ravenclaw common room. Nico, you will be led by Professor Snape to the Slytherin common room." They all walked out of the office and headed towards their common rooms.

* * *

 **Harry POV**

When Harry, Ron and Hermione got back to the common room, Harry led them over to the couches.

"Guys, I need to talk to you about something," said Harry.

"What is it, Harry?" Hermione asked.

"It's about the exchange students," he said. "I followed Nico when he went to the bathroom on the train."

"Why would you do that?" Hermione said.

"There was something off about them. I can't say what, but there was just… something," he replied. "Anyway, I followed him. When he went into the bathroom, I heard running water, then he said 'Oh Iris, goddess of the Rainbow, please accept my offering. Chiron at Camp Half-Blood.' Then I heard a man's voice start talking to him. He asked about a quest. Then he said something about us not suspecting them, about us thinking that they're just regular witches and wizards. Then the man left and someone else came. It was a boy named Will. He and Nico talked about missing each other and some stuff about nightmares. They seemed really close."

"Are you sure that's what you heard, Harry?" Hermione asked. He nodded. "Iris… Iris… I think I've read something somewhere about that. I'll check in the library tomorrow. The nightmares are probably caused by the same thing that made the hat scream like it did when it was put on their heads. Do you think Nico and Will are brothers or something?"

"I don't think so, it didn't sound like it." Harry didn't say what he was suspecting.

"Whatever the case, we can't do anything at the moment so we may as well go to bed." The three friends headed off to their dorms.

* * *

 **Nico POV**

Nico had just finished breakfast and was heading to their first class, Potions. He arrived in the dungeons and lined up for his class when Annabeth and Percy got there. Harry, Hermione and Ron came a few minutes later. Harry was giving him strange looks but Nico just shrugged them off. Professor Snape opened the door. The class filed into the dungeon, the demigods sat at the back behind the trio.

"Settle down," said Snape coldly, shutting the door behind him.

There was no real need for the call to order; the moment the class had heard the door close, quiet had fallen and all fidgeting, except that done by the demigods, stopped. Snape's mere presence was usually enough to ensure a class's silence.

"Today we will be mixing a potion that often comes up at Ordinary Wizarding Levels: the Draught of Peace, a potion to calm anxiety and soothe agitation. Be warned: if you are too heavy-handed with the ingredients you will put the drinker into a heavy and sometimes irreversible sleep, so you will need to pay close attention to what you are doing. The ingredients and method-" Snape flicked his wand "-are on the blackboard-" (they appeared there) "-you will find everything you need-' he flicked his wand again "-in the store cupboard-" (the door of the said cupboard sprang open "-you have an hour and a half… start."

The demigods all looked at each other, thinking the same thing. Eventually, Annabeth put up her hand and Snape came over.

"You have a problem?" asked Snape. Nico noticed that most of the class was watching them. _Great_ , he thought, _we're the centre of attention_.

"Um… you see Professor, we're all dyslexic," Annabeth said.

"Are you now?" said Snape. "All three of you?" They nodded, aware of everyone's eyes on them. "Very well, would anyone like to volunteer to read the instructions to these three?" Hermione's hand shot up into the air.

"I'll do it, Professor," she said.

"Well then, what are you waiting for?" And with that, he walked off. Hermione moved her stuff over next to the demigods, with some strange looks from Harry. The potion was difficult and fiddly. The demigods, having never brewed a potion before, had trouble with it. Hermione helped them a lot. She would read out the instruction carefully, which made it easier for them.

"A light silver vapour should now be rising from your potion," called Snape, with ten minutes to go.

Nico's potion was nearly perfect, as was Annabeth's, except Percy. His had black vapour coming from it. She saw that Hermione's was absolutely perfect. Snape swept by their table, not commenting on theirs, though he stopped for a moment on Percy's.

"Too much powdered moonstone," he said before turning away. He stopped once again at Harry's with a large smirk on his face.

"Potter, what is this supposed to be?"

"The Draught of Peace," said Harry tensely.

"Tell me, Potter," said Snape softly, "can you read?"

Nico glared at him, at his use of words. He heard Malfoy laugh.

"Yes, I can," said Harry.

"Read the third line of the instructions for me, Potter."

Harry looked over at the blackboard.

"'Add powdered moonstone, stir three times counter-clockwise, allow to simmer for seven minutes then add two drops of syrup of hellebore.'"

"Did you do everything on the third line, Potter?"

"No," said Harry very quietly.

"I beg your pardon?"

"No," said Harry, more loudly. "I forgot the hellebore."

"I know you did, Potter, which means that this mess is utterly worthless. _Evanesco_."

The contents of Harry's potion vanished, he was left standing foolishly beside an empty cauldron.

"Those of you who have managed to read the instructions, fill one flagon with a sample of your potion, label it clearly with your name and bring it up to my desk for testing," said Snape. "Homework: twelve inches of parchment in the properties of moonstone and its use in potion-making, to be handed in on Thursday."

Everyone did as he said, except Harry, who was glaring at everyone. The bell rang, and everyone headed to lunch.

* * *

 **I hope you like that chapter.**

 **I know Draco was kind of OOC, but I don't care. Anyway, I made him like this because he's one of my favourite characters, and I want him to like Nico, feelings which will obviously not be returned, because Solangelo. Yes, I do believe that Draco is gay. If you don't agree, it's fine. Besides, his crush on Nico will only play a small part in the story because it is only temporary.**

 **I got most of the potions class from the book. The next chapter might have bits from the book too.**

 **Please review.**

 **See you next week.**


	4. Chapter 4

**Hey guys.**

 **A/N at the end.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own anything… yet. I'm working on it. I'll let you know when I succeed.**

 **Enjoy…**

* * *

 **Nico POV**

After Potions, they headed to Divination. Nico was not looking forward to it. Tea leaves and crystal balls couldn't tell the future. This was a waste of their time. He wished he was back at camp with Will. Nico would never admit it to anyone but the boy in question, but he missed him like crazy. He missed the touch of Will's lips on his, his hands running through his hair. His… Nico shook himself. _Snap out of it,_ he thought.

He sat down at a table with the other demigods. Harry and Ron were sitting at the table next to them. Harry was still angry from potions.

"Good-day," said the teacher, Professor Trelawney. "And welcome back to Divination. I have, of course, been following your fortunes most carefully over the holidays, and am delighted to see that you have returned to Hogwarts safely-as, of course, I knew you would." Nico tuned out as she continued to babble on.

"Turn, please, to the introduction and read what Imago has to say on the matter of dream interpretation. Then, divide into pairs. Use _The Dream Oracle_ to interpret each other's most recent dreams. Carry on."

After struggling through the reading, the demigods looked at each other, not wanting to share their dreams. None of them willing to talk about their nightmares from Tartarus. Nico noticed Harry and Ron joking around at the table next to them. He scowled at them. Then Trelawney came around to them. She stopped in front of them and her eyes clouded over.

 _The greatest half-blood to ever live,  
Shall journey to find the boy who lived,  
Crow and owl guide the way,  
To find the place where wizards lay,  
The darkness there must not be named,  
Sons of prophecy prove its bane. _

They all stared at her as she recited the prophecy. The whole class was silent. But she wasn't done…

 _A child of the eldest gods,  
Shall reach sixteen against all odds,  
Shall see the world in endless sleep,  
A hero's soul, cursed blade shall reap,  
A single choice shall end his days,  
Olympus to preserve or raze._

 _Seven half-bloods shall answer the call,  
To storm or fire the world must fall,  
An oath to keep with a final breath,  
And foes bear arms to the Doors of Death._

When she finished the Prophecy of the Seven, her eyes turned back to normal. She looked at their pale faces and looked confused.

"I only came over to see how you were going, nothing to be afraid of," she said. The three demigods looked at each other, then at the whole class who was watching in silence. Trelawney noticed everyone staring. "Get back to work everyone," she said before walking off. The demigods slowly got over their shock. Annabeth was about to say something when Nico gave her a look that said, _We'll talk about this later_. He made a small movement with his head in the direction of Harry and Ron, who were both watching them. They silently agreed.

* * *

Next up they had History of Magic. When they got there, they saw that the teacher, Professor Binns, was a ghost. Nico glanced at the other demigods, Percy was smirking. This lesson would be interesting. They were the last ones to walk in, and when Binns saw Nico he paled, as much as a ghost could.

"M-M-Master Nico, I-I-" he stuttered.

"Save it," said Nico. "You know Father's not happy with you."

"Y-yes, Master," he said.

"That's not good enough. You know how much more work he has to do because of you," he said.

"I-" Binns started. Nico put up her hand to stop the blabbering ghost. He felt the whole class looking at him.

"We'll leave it for now." He went and sat at the back of the class. "Continue with your lesson."

"Y-yes, Master," he said. Nico shook his head but didn't say anything. When he glanced at the others again, Percy was grinning, and Annabeth was suppressing a smile herself. Nico noticed Harry looking at him. Nico glared at him, making him flinch and turn away. The rest of the lesson was boring, and Nico's ADHD made it impossible for him to focus.

* * *

They had Herbology next. The class Nico was dreading. Every time he went close to a plant, it would die. Being in a room full of plants, surrounded by people, he knew it couldn't end well. Nico knew others would be getting suspicious of the demigods now, after Divination and History of Magic. This lesson was not going to help. The teacher gestured for them to enter and they crowded into the greenhouse. Nico, Percy, Annabeth, Hermione, Ron and Harry, who was still looking at Nico sceptically, stood around a table.

It was only a few minutes into the lesson when the plant in front of Nico started to die. He groaned quietly. Percy glanced over at the sound and a wide grin spread over his face. Nico glared at him.

"No, no, no, no!" Nico whispered urgently as his plant got worse. Percy stifled a laugh. The son of Hades glared at him. This was a mistake. In response to his anger, all the plants on their table died. This time Percy couldn't hold in his laughter. Professor Sprout came over.

"What's so funny over here?" she said. Then she noticed the plants. "What did you do to my plants?" She looked around until her eyes landed on Nico. "How did you kill all the plants?"

"I don't know, it just… happens," replied Nico.

"Well, please stop it," Sprout said angrily.

"I can't. But," Nico said, an idea popping into his head, "if I leave, they will stop dying." She looked at them for a second before sighing.

"Very well. You don't have to come to my classes anymore," she said. Nico glanced at Percy, whose smile had disappeared, replaced with a look of annoyance. The son of Hades left, holding back his grin until he had walked out the door. Grinning, he headed back to his common room.

* * *

 **Harry POV**

The Americans had been weird all day. It started off in Potions when they found out they all had dyslexia. Divination was when things got really weird. Just as Trelawney got close to them, she started saying random things that made all three Americans pale up. _What did it mean?_ Then in Herbology, the plants started dying, and apparently, Nico had done it. He hadn't seen him do anything to the plants but he had confessed to doing something. Percy had found it hilarious. _Why?_

Anyway, now Harry was heading to Care of Magical Creatures with Hermione and Ron. The Americans were walking in front of them, talking in whispers. Harry tried listening to them but only caught a few words; _prophecy, secret, quest_ and _Hades._ He wondered what Hades was. He turned to Hermione, who was talking to Ron about something.

"Hey, Hermione," Harry said. "Do you know what Hades is?"

"Why?" she asked.

"I heard the Americans talking about it," he replied.

"I think I might have heard it before. I'll go to the library later, I also need to check out the 'Iris' thing," said Hermione. Just then, they arrived at the edge of the forbidden forest. Professor Grubbly-Plank was there. Harry wondered where Hagrid was.

"Good afternoon, class," she said. A chorus of 'good afternoons' was said in return. "This year we will start off with bowtruckles. Grab a bowtruckle and get into groups of three. You will draw your bowtruckle to the best of your ability. You may use the woodlice provided to help. Now off you go."

Harry, Ron and Hermione got their bowtruckles and some woodlice and sat down. Harry spent the whole time scowling at the Americans. He was sure that the Americans weren't who they said they were.

* * *

 **I hope you liked that chapter, though it was quite a bit shorter.**

 **I did get a bit of the lessons from the actual book.**

 **Please review.**

 **See you next week.**


	5. Chapter 5

**Hey guys.**

 **A/N at the end.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own it.**

 **Enjoy…**

* * *

 **Percy POV**

When the demigods entered the DADA classroom, they found a woman, who resembled a toad, seated at the teacher's desk. The class was quiet as it entered the room; the new teacher, Professor Umbridge was, as yet, an unknown quantity and nobody knew how strict a disciplinarian she was likely to be.

"Well, good afternoon!" she said when finally, the whole class had sat down.

A few people mumbled 'good afternoon' in reply.

"Tut, tut," said Professor Umbridge. "That won't do, now, will it? I should like you, please, to reply 'Good afternoon, Professor Umbridge'. One more time, please. Good afternoon, class!"

"Good afternoon, Professor Umbridge," they chanted back at her.

"There now," said Umbridge sweetly. "That wasn't too difficult, was it? Wands away and quills out, please."

Many of the class exchanged gloomy looked; the order 'wands away' had never yet been followed by a lesson they had found interesting. Umbridge opened her handbag, extracted her own wand, which was an unusually short one, and tapped the blackboard sharply with it; words appeared on the board at once. Percy didn't bother reading it.

"Well now, your teaching in this subject has been rather disrupted and fragmented, hasn't it?" stated Umbridge, turning to face the class with her hands clasped neatly in front of her. "The constant…" Percy zoned out of the toads lecture.

After a few minutes Percy realised that Umrbidge had become silent and the other students were writing something down. Percy glanced at Annabeth's page, attempted to decode her writing before giving up and fiddling with Riptide again. When everyone else had finished writing, Umbridge asked, "Has everybody got a copy of Defensive Magical Theory by Wilbert Slinkhard?"

There was a dull murmur of assent throughout the class.

"I think we'll try that again," said Umbridge. "When I ask you a question, I should like you to reply, "Yes, Professor Umbridge", or "No, Professor Umbridge". So: has everyone got a copy of Defensive Magical Theory by Wilbert Slinkhard?"

"Yes, Professor Umbridge," rang through the room.

"Good," said Umbridge. "I should like you to turn to page five and read 'Chapter One, Basics for Beginners'. There will be no need to talk."

Umbridge left the blackboard and settled herself in the chair behind the teacher's desk, observing them all closely with those pouchy toad's eyes. Percy turned to page five of his copy of Defensive Magical Theory and struggled to read.

It was desperately dull. He felt his concentration sliding away from him, as it always did with his ADHD. Several silent minutes passed. Percy looked to his right and saw Hermione had not even opened her copy of Defensive Magical Theory. She was staring fixedly at Umbridge with her hand in the air.

While Hermione was staring at Umbridge, the toad was just as resolutely looking in another direction.

After several more minutes had passed, however, Percy was not the only one watching Hermione. The chapter they had been instructed to read was so tedious that more and more people were choosing to watch Hermione's mute attempt to catch Umbridge's eye rather than struggle on with 'Basics for Beginners'.

When more than half the class were staring at Hermione rather than at their books, Umbridge seemed to decide that she could ignore the situation no longer.

"Did you want to ask something about the chapter, dear?" she asked Hermione, as though she had only just noticed her.

"Not about the chapter, no," said Hermione.

"Well, we're reading just now," said Umbridge, showing her small pointed teeth. "If you have other queries, we can deal with them at the end of class."

"I've got a query about your course aims," said Hermione.

Professor Umbridge raised her eyebrows.

"And your name is?"

"Hermione Granger," said Hermione.

"Well, Miss Granger, I think the course aims are perfectly clear if you read them through carefully," said Umbridge in a voice of determined sweetness.

"Well, I don't," said Hermione bluntly. "There's nothing written up there about using defensive spells."

There was a short silence in which many members of the class turned their heads to frown at the three course aims still written on the blackboard.

"Using defensive spells?" Umbridge repeated with a little laugh. "Why, I can't imagine any situation arising in my classroom that would require you to use a defensive spell, Miss Granger. You surely aren't expecting to be attacked during class?'"

"We're not going to use magic?" Ron exclaimed loudly.

"Students raise their hands when they wish to speak in my class, Mr. — ?"

"Weasley," said Ron, thrusting his hand into the air.

Umbridge, smiling still more widely, turned her back on him. Harry and Hermione immediately raised their hands too. Umbridge's pouchy eyes lingered on Harry for a moment before she addressed Hermione.

"Yes, Miss Granger? You wanted to ask something else?"

"Yes," said Hermione. "Surely the whole point of Defence Against the Dark Arts is to practise defensive spells?"

"Are you a Ministry-trained educational expert, Miss Granger?" asked Umbridge, in her falsely sweet voice.

"No, but — "

"Well then, I'm afraid you are not qualified to decide what the "whole point" of any class is. Wizards much older and cleverer than you have devised our new programme of study. You will be learning about defensive spells in a secure, risk-free way —"

"What use is that?" said Harry loudly. "If we're going to be attacked, it won't be in a —"

"Hand, Mr Potter!" sang Umbridge.

Harry thrust his fist in the air. Again, Umbridge promptly turned away from him, but now several other people had their hands up, too, including Percy.

"Yes, Mr — ?"

"Jackson."

"You have something to say, Mr Jackson."

"What's the point of learning the theory? We need to practice the spells, so that we can defend ourselves if we're attacked, which, by the way, will not be 'risk-free'."

"I repeat," said Umbridge, smiling in a very irritating fashion at Percy, "do you expect to be attacked during my classes?"

"In class, no. But in the real world, yes."

"This isn't the real world, Mr Jackson."

"But isn't school supposed to prepare us for the real world."

"You are learning the theory so that you can pass the examinations."

"But — "

"Five points Mr Jackson," Umbridge said smiling sweetly as she continued. "I do not wish to criticise the way things have been run in this school," she said, an unconvincing smile stretching her wide mouth, "but you have been exposed to some very irresponsible wizards in this class, very irresponsible indeed — not to mention," she gave a nasty little laugh, "extremely dangerous half-breeds."

Percy blood boiled, whether she meant demigods or not, he didn't care. He hated this stupid toad.

"If you mean Professor Lupin," piped up Dean angrily, "he was the best we ever —"

"Hand, Mr Thomas! As I was saying — you have been introduced to spells that have been complex, inappropriate to your age group and potentially lethal. You have been frightened into believing that you are likely to meet Dark attacks every other day —"

"No we haven't," Hermione said, "we just — "

"Your hand is not up, Miss Granger!"

Hermione put up her hand. Umbridge turned away from her.

"It is my understanding that my predecessor not only performed illegal curses in front of you, he actually performed them on you."

"Well, he turned out to be a maniac, didn't he?" said Dean hotly. "Mind you, we still learned loads."

"Your hand is not up, Mr Thomas!" trilled Umbridge. "Now, it is the view of the Ministry that a theoretical knowledge will be more than sufficient to get you through your examination, which, after all, is what school is all about. And your name is?" she added, staring at Parvati, whose hand had just shot up.

"Parvati Patil, and isn't there a practical bit in our Defence Against the Dark Arts O.W.L? Aren't we supposed to show that we can actually do the counter-curses and things?"

"As long as you have studied the theory hard enough, there is no reason why you should not be able to perform the spells under carefully controlled examination conditions," said Umbridge dismissively.

"Theory won't help," said Percy. "You need to practice to get good. Especially if you're being tested on it."

"You're scared," Nico said. "You're scared that we'll attack you."

"I —"

"That's why you're only letting us perform the spells, and I quote, 'under carefully controlled examination conditions'," said Nico.

"It is for the safety of everyone," Umbridge said.

"We have to sit the exam without ever practising the spells beforehand?" said Parvati incredulously. "Are you telling us that the first time we'll get to do the spells will be during our exam?"

"I repeat, as long as you have studied the theory hard enough —"

"And what good's theory going to be in the real world?" said Harry loudly, his fist in the air again.

Umbridge looked up.

"As I told Mr Jackson, this is school, Mr Potter, not the real world," she said softly.

"So, we're not supposed to be prepared for what's waiting for us out there?"

"There is nothing waiting out there, Mr Potter."

"Oh, yeah?" said Harry. His temper, which seemed to have been bubbling just beneath the surface all day, was reaching boiling point.

"Who do you imagine wants to attack children like yourselves?" enquired Umbridge in a horribly honeyed voice.

"Hmm, let's think …" said Harry in a mock thoughtful voice." Maybe ... Lord Voldemort?"

Ron gasped; Lavender Brown uttered a little scream; Neville slipped sideways off his stool. Umbridge, however, did not flinch. She was staring at Harry with a grimly satisfied expression on her face.

"Ten points from Gryffindor, Mr Potter."

The classroom was silent and still. Everyone was staring at either Umbridge or Harry.

"Now, let me make a few things quite plain."

Umbridge stood up and leaned towards them, her stubby-fingered hands splayed on her desk.

"You have been told that a certain Dark wizard has returned from the dead —"

"He wasn't dead, "said Harry angrily, "but yeah, he's returned!"

"Mr-Potter-you-have-already-lost-your-house-ten-points-do-not-make-matters-worse-for-yourself," said Umbridge in one breath without looking at him. "As I was saying, you have been informed that a certain dark wizard is at large once again. This is a lie."

"It is NOT a lie!" said Harry. "I saw him, I fought him!"

"Detention, Mr Potter!" said Umbridge triumphantly. "Tomorrow evening. Five o'clock. My office. I repeat, this is a lie. The Ministry of Magic guarantees that you are not in danger from any Dark wizard. If you are still worried, by all means, come and see me outside class hours. If someone is alarming you with fibs about reborn Dark wizards, I would like to hear about it. I am here to help. I am your friend." Percy's hand shot up.

"What is your question now, Mr Jackson?"

"It doesn't matter whether this Voldemort is back or not," he said. "There are so many other threats out there and learning to defend yourself is the only way your gonna survive."

"What would you know about that, Mr Jackson?"

"A lot more than you," he said. She raised her eyebrows.

"You believe that you have more experience than me?" Umbridge asked.

"Yes!" he said. Then, he realised his mistake when he saw his friends' faces.

"Do you now?" Umbridge said. "You think you have more experience with these kinds of situations?"

"He didn't mean that," said Annabeth.

"And what is your name?"

"Annabeth Chase," she answered.

"Well, Miss Chase, if you wish to speak, you will put your hand up, understood?"

"Yes," replied Annabeth. Umbridge turned to Nico, who had put up his hand.

"Yes, Mr —?"

"di Angelo."

"What is it, Mr di Angelo?"

"You say we don't need to be able to defend ourselves because Voldemort's dead," Nico said. "But, Voldemort's not the only dark wizard out there, is he? There could be others in the future, so we should be taught to defend ourselves."

"The Ministry assures you that, if there is any threat, we will take care of it," Umbridge answered.

"Yeah," said Nico. "You seem to be doing a great job with Voldemort."

"Please join Mr Potter in detention, Mr di Angelo."

Umbridge sat down behind her desk. Harry, however, stood up. Everyone was staring at him; Seamus looked half-scared, half-fascinated.

"Harry, no!" Hermione whispered in a warning voice, tugging at his sleeve, but Harry jerked his arm out of her reach.

"So, according to you, Cedric Diggory dropped dead of his own accord, did he?" Harry asked, his voice shaking.

There was a collective intake of breath from the class. Percy had no idea who Cedric was. Everyone was staring avidly from Harry to Umbridge, who had raised her eyes and was staring at him without a trace of a fake smile on her face.

"Cedric Diggory's death was a tragic accident," she said coldly.

"It was murder," said Harry. Percy could see that he was shaking. "Voldemort killed him, and you know it."

Umbridge's face was quite blank. For a moment, Harry thought she was going to scream at him. Then she said, in her softest, most sweetly girlish voice, "Come here, Mr Potter, dear."

He kicked his chair aside, strode around Ron and Hermione and up to the teacher's desk.

Umbridge pulled a small roll of pink parchment out of her handbag, stretched it out on the desk, dipped her quill into a bottle of ink and started scribbling, hunched over. Nobody spoke. After a minute or so she rolled up the parchment and tapped it with her wand; it sealed itself seamlessly so that he could not open it.

"Take this to Professor McGonagall, dear," said Umbridge, holding out the note to him. He took it from her without saying a word, turned on his heel and left the room, slamming the classroom door shut behind him.

* * *

After their first day of classes, Percy wanted to just sit down and relax, but he was meeting Nico and Annabeth in the library to do homework. The other two were already there when Percy arrived. He sat down next to Annabeth at a table and took out his books.

"Ugghhh, I have so much homework," Percy complained.

"Shut up, Seaweed Brain," replied Annabeth. "At least magical homework is more interesting."

"It still sucks," Percy said.

"I've only been studying for five minutes," said Nico, "and I'm already bored."

"You don't have as much homework as us though," Percy said. "You dropped out of Herbology, remember?"

"Only because I can't be around plants without them dying," replied Nico. "Speaking of class though, people might be getting suspicious of us."

"Yeah, something happened in nearly every class, and the sorting ceremony didn't help either," Annabeth said.

"Do you mind if we sit with you?" Hermione said as she, Harry and Ron walked up.

"Not at all," replied Annabeth as she made room for them. Nico hesitantly did the same and recoiled slightly when Harry sat down next to him. There was silence for a moment, then Harry spoke.

"How were your memories so bad it made the Sorting Hat react like that?" he asked. The demigods glanced at each other.

"We've been through a lot," replied Percy. "We don't really like talking about it."

"Oh, sorry," said Harry. They all went back to work. After a few minutes, Percy started getting bored. He unconsciously started tapping Riptide on the table. A few more minutes passed before Hermione got fed up with the noise.

"Could you please stop tapping your pen," she said. Percy became aware of what he was doing and muttered an apology as he stopped. "Why do you have a pen anyway?" Hermione asked. Percy shrugged. He did not feel like explaining so he went back to his homework. Another few minutes passed before Ron couldn't hold in his question.

"Why was Professor Binns so scared of you?" he asked Nico. "Why did he call you master? Why does your father have more work because of him?" Nico shrugged.

"I'm good at scaring people," Nico replied simply.

"What about in Herbology," Harry said, "when the plants died."

"As I said, it kind of just… happens," answered Nico.

"But why does it only happen to you?" asked Harry.

"I guess it might have something to do with my heritage," Nico said.

"What do you mean?" Ron asked. Nico shrugged.

"What about in Divination, when Trelawney started saying all those random things?" asked Harry. "You all paled up when she started."

"We've heard those things before, that's all," said Annabeth.

"It sounded like a load of gibberish to me," Ron said.

"It's nothing you need to worry about," Annabeth replied, ending the conversation. Soon, they all headed off to their respective common rooms before going to dinner.

* * *

 **This chapter made me so angry, I hate Umbridge so freaking much.**

 **Anyway, I hoped you liked that chapter.**

 **I got a lot of that from the book.**

 **Please review.**

 **See you next week.**


	6. Chapter 6

**Disclaimer: JK Rowling and Uncle Rick own everything… for now.**

* * *

 **Nico POV**

Nico made his way back to the Slytherin common room after their study session.

As he entered the Slytherin common room she ran into Malfoy. He snarled for second before he realised who it was. A smile crept onto his face.

'Hey Nico," he said. Nico didn't look at him.

"Please leave me alone," said Nico. Malfoy frowned.

"What's wrong?" he asked. Nico shook his head.

"It's nothing," he said as he tried to get past Malfoy, but the other boy blocked him.

"Come on, you can tell me," said Malfoy.

"Please, just let me through," Nico said, still not looking at him. Malfoy sighed in defeat and stepped aside. He walked past him, but after a few steps he turned back.

"Thanks," said Nico before walking up the stairs to his dorm.

The next day went slightly better than the previous. With classes like Charms and Transfiguration, Nico thought it would have been almost impossible to blow their cover. Thankfully, he was right. Nothing else happened that may reveal their identities, though people were still suspicious after their classes the day before. In both Charms and Transfiguration Nico did not pay attention, not because they weren't interesting, but simply due to his ADHD.

The demigods had agreed to meet up again to do their homework. This time Percy and Annabeth beat Nico. The son of Hades sat down across from the couple. As Nico got out his books, Annabeth started talking.

They worked for a few minutes before Annabeth remembered something. "You remember the weird creatures that pulled the carriages, right?" The others all nodded. "They bowed to both of you. I mean, it's obvious why they bowed to Percy but why did they bow to you?"

"They're called Thestrals," answered Nico. "They're creatures of the Underworld. Poseidon and Hades both made them. They're a type of horse, making them creatures of Poseidon, but they can only be seen by those who have witnessed death, that was Hades's part. Because of that, they bow to me as well."

"So, you've seen them before?" asked Percy.

"No, I've just heard about them," Nico replied before looking at his watch. "Shit! I totally forgot that I have detention with Umbridge. See you later." Nico grabbed his stuff and walked off.

* * *

 **Harry POV**

The next day passed with less weird events than the previous. Before Harry knew, it was time for his detention with Umbridge and Nico. When he got to Umbridge's office, Nico was already waiting. He knocked on the door and it opened. They walked inside.

The surfaces in Umbridge's office were draped in lacy covers and cloths, and several vases of dried flowers stood on doilies around the room. One wall housed a collection of ornamental plates, each decorated with a large technicolour kitten wearing a different bow around its neck. These were so foul that Harry stared at them, transfixed, until Umbridge spoke.

"Good evening, Mr Potter, Mr di Angelo."

Harry started and looked around. He had not noticed her at first because she was wearing a luridly flowered set of robes that blended only too well with the tablecloth on the desk behind her.

"Evening, Professor Umbridge," Harry said stiffly. Nico said nothing.

"Well, sit down," she said, pointing towards two small tables draped in lace beside which she had drawn up a couple of straight-backed chairs. A piece of blank parchment lay on each table, apparently waiting for them.

"Er," said Harry, without moving. "Professor Umbridge. Er – before we start, I – I wanted to ask you a ... a favour."

Her bulging eyes narrowed.

"Oh, yes?"

"Well, I'm ... I'm in the Gryffindor Quidditch team. And I was supposed to be at the tryouts for the new Keeper at five o'clock on Friday and I was – was wondering whether I could skip detention that night and do it – do it another night ... instead …"

He knew long before he reached the end of his sentence that it was no good.

"Oh, no," said Umbridge, smiling so widely that she looked as though she had just swallowed a particularly juicy fly. "Oh, no, no, no. This is your punishment for spreading evil, nasty, attention-seeking stories, Mr Potter, and punishments certainly cannot be adjusted to suit the guilty one's convenience. No, you will come here at five o'clock tomorrow, and the next day, and on Friday too, and you will do your detentions as planned. I think it rather a good thing that you are missing something you really want to do. It ought to reinforce the lesson I am trying to teach you."

Harry felt the blood surge to his head and heard a thumping noise in his ears. So, he told 'evil, nasty, attention-seeking stories', did he?

She was watching him with her head slightly to one side, still smiling widely, as though she knew exactly what he was thinking and was waiting to see whether he would start shouting again. With a massive effort, Harry looked away from her, dropped his school bag beside the straight-backed chair and sat down. Nico had already done so.

"There," said Umbridge sweetly, "we're getting better at controlling our temper already, aren't we? Now, you are going to be doing some lines for me. No, not with your quill," she added, as Nico bent down to open his bag. "You're going to be using some rather special ones of mine. Here you are."

She handed each of them a long, thin black quill with an unusually sharp point.

"Uh… Professor?" said Nico.

"Yes, dear," Umbridge replied.

"I have dyslexia."

"Well, I guess that's just part of the punishment," said Umbridge with a sweet smile on her face. Nico glared at her. "I want you, Mr Potter, to write, I must not tell lies," she told him softly. "And Mr di Angelo, you will write, I must trust my superiors."

"How many times?" Nico asked, with a creditable imitation of politeness.

"Oh, as long as it takes for the message to sink in," said Umbridge sweetly. "Off you go."  
She moved over to her desk, sat down and bent over a stack of parchment that looked like essays for marking. Harry raised the sharp black quill, then realised what was missing.

"You haven't given us any ink," he said.

"Oh, you won't need ink," said Umbridge, with the merest suggestion of a laugh in her voice.

Harry placed the point of the quill on the paper and wrote: I must not tell lies.

He let out a gasp of pain. The words had appeared on the parchment in what appeared to be shining red ink. At the same time, the words had appeared on the back of Harry's right hand, cut into his skin as though traced there by a scalpel – yet even as he stared at the shining cut, the skin healed over again, leaving the place where it had been slightly redder than before but quite smooth.

Harry looked around at Umbridge. She was watching him, her wide, toadlike mouth stretched in a smile.

"Yes?"

"Nothing," said Harry quietly.

He glanced at Nico. He had just finished writing his first line. He made no sound as the words were cut into his skin, though there was a look of surprise on his face. Harry saw him look closer at his quill and recognition crossed his face. _He knows what these quills are, but how?_ The writing looked weird too, but Harry thought that was because he couldn't see it properly.

He looked back at the parchment, placed the quill on it once more, wrote I must not tell lies, and felt the searing pain on the back of his hand for a second time; once again, the words had been cut into his skin; once again, they healed over seconds later.

And on it went. Again, and again Harry wrote the words on the parchment in what he soon came to realise was not ink, but his own blood. And, again and again, the words were cut into the back of his hand, healed, and reappeared the next time he set quill to parchment.

Darkness fell outside Umbridge's window. Harry did not ask when he would be allowed to stop. He did not even check his watch. He knew she was watching him for signs of weakness and he was not going to show any, not even if he had to sit there all night, cutting open his own hand with this quill ...

"Come here," Umbridge said, after what seemed hours.

He stood up and Nico did the same. His hand was stinging painfully. When he looked down at it, he saw that the cut had healed, but that the skin there was red raw.

"Hands," she said.

They both extended their hands. Umbridge took Harry's hand in her own. Harry repressed a shudder as she touched him with her thick, stubby fingers on which she wore a number of ugly old rings. Then she let his go and reached for Nico's. Harry noticed that his hand wasn't as red as Harry's. Umbridge pushed on Nico's hand, but he showed no emotion.

"Tut, tut, I don't seem to have made much of an impression yet," she said, smiling. "Well, we'll just have to try again tomorrow evening, won't we? You may go."

Harry left her office without a word, Nico close behind him. The school was quite deserted; it was surely past midnight. Nico walked off to the Slytherin common room. Harry walked slowly up the corridor, then, when he had turned the corner and was sure Umbridge would not hear him, broke into a run.

While back in her office, Umbridge collected their sheets, only to find Nico's covered in Ancient Greek writing.

* * *

The next morning, Harry met Hermione and Ron in the common room.

"How was your detention? What did Umbridge make you do?" Hermione asked.

"It was alright," replied Harry. "We had to do lines."

"Well, that wasn't too bad, was it?" asked Ron. Harry shook his head. Then, a thought occurred to him.

"Hey, Hermione. Have you gone to the library yet?" Harry said.

"Yeah, I looked up Iris and Hades," she replied. "I couldn't find anything, but I'll go back this afternoon to keep looking."

"Did you hear Percy last night?" Ron asked.

"Yeah, I heard him from my dorm. It went on for ages. What happened?" Hermione said.

"It must have been the nightmares that I heard Nico talking about on the train," Harry answered. "I wondered what happened to them…"

* * *

 **Percy POV**

The next few days passed, and the next thing Percy knew, it was Friday. They were eating breakfast in the Great Hall when Ron mentioned something called 'Quidditch'.

"So, are you gonna try out for the Gryffindor Quidditch team?" Ron asked him.

"What's that?" Percy frowned.

"You don't know what Quidditch is!?" Ron asked in disbelief. When he saw Percy's expressions, his eyes widened in shock. "You've got to be joking!"

"Calm down, Ron!" Hermione exclaimed. "They might not have Quidditch in America."

"What is 'Quidditch'?" Percy asked.

"It's only the best sport ever!" said Ron. Percy shook his head.

"Never heard of it," he said. Ron stared at him incredulously.

"You're not serious!?" Ron cried.

"Get over it, Ronald," Hermione said. Then she turned to the son of Poseidon. "Quidditch is a popular wizarding sport that you play on broomsticks. Each team has seven players that include; two beaters, three chasers, a keeper and a seeker. The chasers…"

Hermione continued to explain the basic rules of Quidditch.

"I'm probably not gonna try out," Percy said, once Hermione had finished explaining.

"Why not?" Harry asked.

"I'm not good with heights," said Percy.

"What about Annabeth and Nico?" Hermione asked.

"Nico probably won't, but Annabeth might," Percy answered.

"Is Nico scared of heights too?" Ron said.

"Yeah, I guess you could say that," replied Percy.

"Well, the Gryffindor tryouts are today at five o'clock," said Ron.

"I wish I could come," said Harry. "But Umbridge won't let me." They all nodded with sympathy.

"Speaking of your detentions," Hermione said as she grabbed Harry's arm and pulled up his sleeve. "Why didn't you tell us what she was doing to you?" She held his hand so that they could all see the words engraved there.

"Wait, that's what you've been doing for detentions?" Percy asked. "Nico hasn't mentioned anything." After a moment of thought, he mumbled. "Though he did ask for extra ambrosia…" Then, he seemed to realise what he had said.

"What's ambrosia?" Harry asked him.

"Uh… it's this stuff that we have in America," said Percy, mentally slapping himself. He tried to think of a good story. "I-It's kind of like a tastes disgusting, but we've gotten used to it." The others nodded.

They ate in silence for the next few minutes. Once they had all finished, they headed off to their classes.

* * *

 **Nico POV**

Nico made his way down to the Quidditch pitch. He had come to watch the Quidditch tryouts. Slytherin had theirs first then Gryffindor. He had arrived early to see his house's tryouts before he had to head back for his detention with Umbridge.

Nico walked onto the pitch and saw some Slytherins warming up. Malfoy spotted him and walked over.

'Come to tryout, have you?" Malfoy said.

"No," replied Nico.

"Scared, di Angelo?" teased Malfoy, though he still had that look in his eyes that he only had around Nico.

"No," Nico said. "I've just never flown before." Malfoy raised an eyebrow.

"Don't you have Quidditch in America?" he asked. Nico shrugged.

"Not where I live," replied Nico. Malfoy seemed slightly shocked.

"Whatever," Malfoy said as he walked off. Nico made his way up to the stands to watch.

The Slytherin tryouts went fairly quickly and soon Nico was heading back up to the castle for his detention with Umbridge.

* * *

 **Percy POV**

 _Finally_ , thought Percy, _it's the weekend_. After a long week of magical classes, Percy was glad he could finally relax. He and Annabeth made their way down to the Great Lake to meet Nico, Harry, Ron and Hermione. They had decided to invite the three followers of Hecate so that they can get to know them better. After all, they were here to protect Harry. They also wanted to stifle any suspicions the trio might have of them.

Annabeth and Percy got their early, and Percy decided to go for a quick swim before the others arrived. Annabeth protested but Percy went anyway. He swam for about five minutes before heading back up to the surface. As his head came out of the water, he saw that Nico had arrived. He swam over to the shore and got out. He was glad no one was watching because, as usual, he was completely dry. He sat down under the tree next to Annabeth and wrapped his arm around her. A few minutes later, Harry, Ron and Hermione got there.

The demigods greeted the trio as they sat down. Annabeth and Hermione started talking about books and homework and gods know what else. Percy turned as Harry spoke.

"So, are you guys liking Hogwarts so far?" he said. Percy shrugged.

"It's cool," said Percy. "Better than all the other schools I've been to." Nico nodded in agreement.

"Yeah, the work is more interesting here," Nico said.

"So, do you come from another magic school in America?" Harry asked.

"Yeah," Nico replied. "But our school is a lot different from yours. Though we still use magic, we practice other skills as well. We do lots of combat, like sword fighting and that kind of stuff." He went with the story that they had made up before coming.

"Cool," said Ron.

They continued talking, mainly complaining about school and homework, for a few hours. When it was about an hour till dawn, they made their way back towards the castle. The followers of Hecate's suspicions about the demigods were forgotten.

* * *

 **I hope you liked that. It was more of a fill-in chapter and was kind of rushed.**

 **Thank you for all the reviews** MMax **and** queenlmno **.**

 **Anyway, please review.**

 **See you next week.**


	7. Chapter 7

**Disclaimer: I don't own Percy Jackson or Harry Potter. I'm working on it.**

* * *

 **Percy POV**

The departing delivery owl had barely cleared the top of the milk jug when Hermione let out a huge gasp and flattened the newspaper, that the owl had delivered, to reveal a large photograph of Dolores Umbridge, smiling widely and blinking slowly at them from beneath the headline.

MINISTRY SEEKS EDUCATIONAL REFORM

DOLORES UMBRIDGE APPOINTED

FIRST EVER HIGH INQUISITOR

"High Inquisitor?" said Percy, his half-eaten piece of toast slipping from his fingers. "What does that mean?'"

Hermione read aloud: "In a surprise move last night the Ministry of Magic passed new legislation giving itself an unprecedented level of control at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

"'The Minister has been growing uneasy about goings-on at Hogwarts for some time,' said Junior Assistant to the Minister, Percy Weasley. 'He is now…" Percy stopped listening until Harry interrupted the ramble of bullshit.

"She's been an immediate success — ' "

"She's been a WHAT?" said Harry loudly.

"Wait, there's more," said Hermione grimly.

"' — an immediate success, totally revolutionising the teaching of Defence Against the Dark Arts and providing the Minister…" Again, Percy zoned out as Hermione read the article.

Hermione finished reading and looked across the table at the others.

"So now we know how we ended up with Umbridge! Fudge passed this "Educational Decree" and forced her on us! And now he's given her the power to inspect the other teachers!" Hermione was breathing fast and her eyes were very bright. "I can't believe this. It's outrageous!"

"I know it is," said Harry. Percy was starting to hate Umbridge more and more. She was starting to get up to the gods level of annoying, which was saying a lot.

But a grin was unfurling on Ron's face.

"What?" said Harry and Hermione together, staring at him.

"Oh, I can't wait to see McGonagall inspected," said Ron happily. "Umbridge won't know what's hit her."

"Well, come on," said Hermione, jumping up, "we'd better get going, if she's inspecting Binns's class we don't want to be late ...'

But Professor Umbridge was not inspecting their History of Magic lesson, which was just as dull as the previous Monday, nor was she in Snape's dungeon when they arrived for double Potions, where Percy's moonstone essay was handed back to him with a large, spiky black 'P' scrawled in an upper corner.

"I have awarded you the grades you would have received if you presented this work in your OWL," said Snape with a smirk, as he swept among them, passing back their homework. "This should give you a realistic idea of what to expect in the examination."

Snape reached the front of the class and turned on his heel to face them.

"The general standard of this homework was abysmal. Most of you would have failed had this been your examination. I expect to see a great deal more effort for this week's essay on the various varieties of venom antidotes, or I shall have to start handing out detentions to those dunces who get a 'D'."

He smirked as Malfoy sniggered and said in a carrying whisper, "Some people got a 'D'? Ha!"

Just like the previous class, Hermione read out the instructions to the demigods. Percy's Strengthening Solution was not precisely the clear turquoise shade of Hermione's, but it was at least blue rather than pink, like Neville's, and he delivered a flask of it to Snape's desk at the end of the lesson.

The three demigods walked out of the classroom and towards their next class. They walked in silence for a few minutes.

"Did you two read the Daily Prophet this morning?" Annabeth asked them.

"Yeah," replied Nico. "I still can't believe someone would be stupid enough to give that toad so much power."

"Perhaps that dark wizard that everyone's afraid of, Voldemort, I think, has infiltrated the Ministry," said Annabeth. "Umbridge does target Harry a bit."

"Or the Minister is just really stupid," Percy said.

"Either way, this woman, if she can even be called that, is really starting to piss me off," Nico said, unconsciously rubbing the back of his hand where he had been forced to cut lines into his skin. "She's getting pretty frustrated with me though because of my hand healing so fast."

"Won't she know that something's up if you never have a lasting scar?" Percy asked him. Nico shrugged.

"Maybe," he replied. "Speaking of my detentions, she's been using this special quill to cut the lines into our hands. I've only seen them one other place."

"Where?" Percy asked when the silence had gone on too long. Nico sighed.

"Not everyone who ends up in the Fields of Punishment needs a special punishment. So, Hades has these quills that cut words into your skin. The same ones Umbridge is using for detentions," he explained. Annabeth frowned and opened her mouth to say something, but they had just reached the ladder that leads to Divination, so she closed it again. It was too risky to talk about this kind of stuff in front of the witches and wizards.

Divination was not very interesting, despite Umbridge inspecting Trelawney. History of Magic and Herbology weren't interesting either. Umbridge inspected Care of Magical Creatures and asked lots of questions about the teacher who usually took it, this guy named Hagrid. Apparently, one of the students had been attacked in Hagrid's first lesson, but Malfoy was the one who said it, so it was probably bullshit. Harry managed to get another detention with Umbridge in Defence against the Dark Arts.

* * *

 **Harry POV**

It was nearly midnight when Harry left Umbridge's office that night, his hand now bleeding so severely that it was staining the scarf he had wrapped around it. Nico had stayed behind on Umbridge's orders, he wondered what that was about. His writing still seemed strange. He shrugged off those thoughts as he entered the common room. He expected it to be empty when he returned, but Ron, Hermione and Percy had sat up waiting for him. He was pleased to see them, especially as Hermione was disposed to be sympathetic rather than critical.

"Here," she said anxiously, pushing a small bowl of yellow liquid towards him, "soak your hand in that, it's a solution of strained and pickled Murtlap tentacles, it should help."

Harry placed his bleeding, aching hand into the bowl and experienced a wonderful feeling of relief. Crookshanks curled around his legs, purring loudly, then leapt into his lap and settled down.

"Thanks," he said gratefully, scratching behind Crookshanks's ears with his left hand.

"I still reckon you should complain about this," said Ron in a low voice.

"No," said Harry flatly.

"McGonagall would go nuts if she knew — "

"Yeah, she probably would," said Harry dully. "And how long do you reckon it'd take Umbridge to pass another decree saying anyone who complains about the High Inquisitor gets sacked immediately?"

Ron opened his mouth to retort, but nothing came out and, after a moment, he closed it again, defeated.

"She's an awful woman," said Hermione in a small voice. "Awful. You know, I was just saying to these guys when you came in… we've got to do something about her."

"I suggested poison," said Percy grimly.

"No… I mean, something about what a dreadful teacher she is, and how we're not going to learn any Defence from her at all," said Hermione.

"Well, what can we do about that?" said Ron, yawning. "It's too late, isn't it? She's got the job, she's here to stay. Fudge'll make sure of that."

"Well," said Hermione tentatively. "You know, I was thinking today…" she shot a slightly nervous look at Harry and then plunged on, "I was thinking that — maybe the time's come when we should just — just do it ourselves."

"Do what ourselves?" said Harry suspiciously, still floating his hand in the essence of Murtlap tentacles.

"Well — learn Defence Against the Dark Arts ourselves," said Hermione.

"Come off it," groaned Ron. "You want us to do extra work? D'you realise Harry and I are behind on homework again and it's only the second week?"

"So are me and Nico," Percy said.

"But this is much more important than homework!" said Hermione.

The boys goggled at her.

"I didn't think there was anything in the universe more important than homework!" said Pecy.

"Don't be silly, of course there is," said Hermione, and Harry saw that her face was suddenly alight with a kind of fervour. "It's about preparing ourselves, as Harry said in Umbridge's first lesson, for what's waiting for us out there. It's about making sure we really can defend ourselves. If we don't learn anything for a whole year — "

"We can't do much by ourselves," said Ron in a defeated voice. "I mean, all right, we can go and look jinxes up in the library and try and practise them, I suppose — "

"No, I agree, we've gone past the stage where we can just learn things out of books," said Hermione. "We need a teacher, a proper one, who can show us how to use the spells and correct us if we're going wrong."

"If you're talking about Lupin…" Harry began.

"No, no, I'm not talking about Lupin," said Hermione. "He's too busy with the Order and, anyway, the most we could see him is during Hogsmeade weekends and that's not nearly often enough."

"Who, then?" said Harry, frowning at her.

Hermione heaved a very deep sigh.

"Isn't it obvious?" she said. "I'm talking about you, Harry."

There was a moment's silence. A light night breeze rattled the windowpanes behind Percy, and the fire guttered.

"About me what?" said Harry.

"I'm talking about you teaching us Defence Against the Dark Arts," Hermione said.

Harry stared at her. Then he turned to Ron, ready to exchange the exasperated looks they sometimes shared. To Harry's consternation, however, Ron did not look exasperated. He looked at Percy, desperately hoping that one person would realise how crazy the idea was, but he was frowning slightly, apparently thinking.

Then he said, "That's an idea."

"What's an idea?" said Harry.

"You," said Ron. "Teaching us to do it."

"But…"

Harry was grinning now, sure the others were pulling his leg.

"But I'm not a teacher, I can't — "

"Harry, you're the best in the year at Defence Against the Dark Arts," said Hermione.

"Me?" said Harry, now grinning more broadly than ever. "No, I'm not, you've beaten me in every test — "

"Actually, I haven't," said Hermione coolly. "You beat me in our third year — the only year we both sat the test and had a teacher who actually knew the subject. But I'm not talking about test results, Harry. Think about what you've done!"

"How d'you mean?"

"You know what, I'm not sure I want someone this stupid teaching me," Ron said to Hermione, smirking slightly. He turned to Harry.

"Let's think," he said, pulling a face like Goyle concentrating. "Uh… first year — you saved the Philosopher's Stone from You-Know-Who."

"But that was luck," said Harry, "it wasn't skill — "

"Second year," Ron interrupted, "you killed the Basilisk and destroyed Riddle."

"Yeah, but if Fawkes hadn't turned up, I — "

"Third year," said Ron, louder still, "you fought off about a hundred Dementors at once — "

"You know that was a fluke, if the Time-Turner hadn't — "

"Last year," Ron said, almost shouting now, "you fought off You-Know-Who again — "

"Listen to me!" said Harry, almost angrily, because Ron and Hermione were both smirking now, while Percy looked slightly shocked at all the things that he'd done. "Just listen to me, all right? It sounds great when you say it like that, but all that stuff was luck — I didn't know what I was doing half the time, I didn't plan any of it, I just did whatever I could think of, and I nearly always had help — "

Percy had gotten over his shock and he had a smirk on his face. Ron and Hermione were still smirking and Harry felt his temper rise; he wasn't even sure why he was feeling so angry.

"Don't sit there grinning like you know better than I do, I was there, wasn't I?" he said heatedly. "I know what went on, all right? And I didn't get through any of that because I was brilliant at Defence Against the Dark Arts, I got through it all because — because help came at the right time, or because I guessed right — but I just blundered through it all, I didn't have a clue what I was doing — STOP LAUGHING!"

The bowl of Murtlap essence fell to the floor and smashed. He became aware that he was on his feet, though he couldn't remember standing up. Crookshanks streaked away under a sofa. All their smiles had vanished.

"You don't know what it's like! You — none of you — you've never had to face him, have you? You think it's just memorizing a bunch of spells and throwing them at him, like you're in class or something?

"The whole time you're sure you know there's nothing between you and dying except your own — your own brain or guts or whatever — like you can think straight when you know you're about a nanosecond from being murdered, or tortured, or watching your friends die — they've never taught us that in their classes, what it's like to deal with things like that — and you three sit there acting like I'm a clever little boy to be standing here, alive — "

"Actually," Percy said, cutting off Harry's rant. "I do know what that's like. I've never faced Voldemort, but I have faced other things — things even worse than Voldemort." He paused for a moment, letting it sink in. "I know what it's like to be a second away from death, I know what it's like to watch friends die, and trust me I've seen that a lot." The trio stared at Percy, their faces a mixture of confusion and shock.

"W-what do you mean?" asked Ron, looking aghast.

"That doesn't matter," said Percy.

"Why don't you teach us then?" Harry asked them.

"I'm not very good at defensive magic, just combat stuff," Percy replied.

"But —"

"Harry," Hermione said timidly, "don't you see? This… this is exactly why we need you… we need to know what it's r-really like… facing him… facing V-Voldemort."

It was the first time she had ever said Voldemort's name and it was this, more than anything else, that calmed Harry. Still breathing hard, he sank back into his chair, becoming aware as he did so that his hand was throbbing horribly again. He wished he had not smashed the bowl of Murtlap essence.

"Well… think about it," said Hermione quietly. "Please?"

Harry could not think of anything to say. He was feeling ashamed of his outburst already. He nodded, hardly aware of what he was agreeing to.

Hermione stood up.

"Well, I'm off to bed," she said, in a voice that was clearly as natural as she could make it. "Erm… night."

Percy and Ron had got to their feet, too.

"Coming?" Ron said awkwardly to Harry.

"Yeah," said Harry. "In… in a minute. I'll just clear this up."

He indicated the smashed bowl on the floor. Ron nodded and they left.

"Reparo," Harry muttered, pointing his wand at the broken pieces of china. They flew back together, good as new, but there was no returning the Murtlap essence to the bowl.

He was suddenly so tired he was tempted to sink back into his armchair and sleep there, but instead, he forced himself to his feet and followed Ron and Percy upstairs. His restless night was punctuated once more by dreams of long corridors and locked doors and he awoke the next day with his scar prickling again.

* * *

 **Nico POV**

Umbridge had been getting more and more annoyed with Nico over the past week. One night Umbridge told him to stay back while Harry left. Umbridge motioned for Nico to come over to her desk. Nico walked over.

"What is this?" Umbridge said in an overly sweet voice.

"What do you mean?" asked Nico.

"This." Umbridge pushed Nico's parchment forward. "What language is this?"

Nico hesitated before answering.

"Greek," he replied.

"And why are you writing in Greek?" Umbridge asked.

"You never said I had to write the lines in English," said Nico.

"No, I did not," Umbridge said, the sweetness of her voice becoming extremely strained. "But in this school, we speak and write in English. So, when I tell you to do lines, you do them in English. Understand?"

There looked at each other for a long moment. Nico wanted to fight back, he'd faced people that were way more dangerous than this toad-faced woman, but he knew that by doing so he would be exposed. With a sigh, he knew that he'd have to do what Umbridge said.

"Yes," he said finally.

"Yes, Professor Umbridge," trilled Umbridge. Nico glared at her.

"Yes, Professor Umbridge."

"Now, I would like you to continue to come for the next two weeks." Another pause, consisting of Nico glaring at Umbridge.

"Yes, Professor Umbridge."

"Good, you may go," Umbridge said.

Nico made his way out of the room, casting one last glare at Umbridge before closing the door.

* * *

 **I hope you liked that chapter. The next few chapters I might use stuff from the book, as I did here.**

 **Anyway, please review, I really like reading them.**

 **See you next week.**


	8. Chapter 8

**Disclaimer: I don't own PJ or HP yet.**

* * *

 **Harry POV**

The next day they walked into Transfiguration ready to see Umbridge put in her place by McGonagall.

Umbridge and her clipboard were sitting in a corner and the sight of her drove the memory of breakfast right out of his head.

"Excellent," whispered Ron, as they sat down in their usual seats. "Let's see Umbridge get what she deserves."

McGonagall marched into the room without giving the slightest indication that she knew Umbridge was there.

"That will do," she said, and silence fell immediately. "Mr Finnigan, kindly come here and hand back the homework — Miss Brown, please take this box of mice — don't be silly, girl, they won't hurt you — and hand one to each student — "

"Hem, hem," said Umbridge, employing the same silly little cough she had used to interrupt Dumbledore on the first night of term. McGonagall ignored her. Seamus handed back Harry's essay; Harry took it without looking at him and saw, to his relief, that he had managed an 'A'.

"Right then, everyone, listen closely — Dean Thomas, if you do that to the mouse again I shall put you in detention — most of you have now successfully Vanished your snails and even those who were left with a certain amount of shell have got the gist of the spell. Today, we shall be — "

"Hem, hem," said Umbridge.

"Yes?" said McGonagall, turning around, her eyebrows so close together they seemed to form one long, severe line.

"I was just wondering, whether you received my note telling you of the date and time of your inspec — "

"Obviously I received it, or I would have asked you what you are doing in my classroom," said McGonagall, turning her back firmly on Umbridge. Many of the students exchanged looks of glee. "As I was saying: today, we shall be practising the altogether more difficult Vanishment of mice. Now, the Vanishing Spell — "

"Hem, hem."

"I wonder," said McGonagall in cold fury, turning on Umbridge, "how you expect to gain an idea of my usual teaching methods if you continue to interrupt me? You see, I do not generally permit people to talk when I am talking."

Umbridge looked as though she had just been slapped in the face. She did not speak, but straightened the parchment on her clipboard and began scribbling furiously.

Looking supremely unconcerned, McGonagall addressed the class once more.

"As I was saying: the Vanishing Spell becomes more difficult with the complexity of the animal to be Vanished. The snail, as an invertebrate, does not present much of a challenge; the mouse, as a mammal, offers a much greater one. This is not, therefore, magic you can accomplish with your mind on your dinner. So — you know the incantation, let me see what you can do…"

"How she can lecture me about not losing my temper with Umbridge!" Harry muttered to Ron under his breath, but he was grinning — his anger with McGonagall had quite evaporated.

Umbridge did not follow McGonagall around the class as she had followed Trelawney; perhaps she realised McGonagall would not permit it. She did, however, take many more notes while sitting in her corner, and when McGonagall finally told them all to pack away, she rose with a grim expression on her face.

"Well, it's a start," said Ron, holding up a long wriggling mouse-tail and dropping it back into the box Lavender was passing around.

As they filed out of the classroom, Harry saw Umbridge approach the teacher's desk; he nudged Ron, who nudged Hermione in turn, and the three of them deliberately fell back to eavesdrop.

"How long have you been teaching at Hogwarts?" Umbridge asked.

"Thirty-nine years this December," said McGonagall brusquely, snapping her bag shut.

Umbridge made a note.

"Very well," she said, "you will receive the results of your inspection in ten days' time."

"I can hardly wait," said McGonagall, in a coldly indifferent voice, and she strode off towards the door. "Hurry up, you three," she added, sweeping Harry, Ron and Hermione before her.

Harry could not help giving her a faint smile and could have sworn he received one in return.

* * *

 **Percy POV**

Hermione made no mention of Harry giving Defence Against the Dark Arts lessons for two whole weeks after her original suggestion. Many things had happened before the subject was broached again, on a wild, blustery evening at the end of September, when the demigods and the followers of Hecate were sitting in the library, looking up potion ingredients for Snape.

"I was wondering," Hermione said suddenly, "whether you'd thought any more about Defence Against the Dark Arts, Harry."

"Course I have," said Harry grumpily, "can't forget it, can we, with that hag teaching us — "

"I meant the idea we had about you teaching us."

Harry did not answer at once. He seemed to be perusing a page of Asiatic Anti-Venoms.

"Well," he said slowly, "yeah, I — I've thought about it a bit."

"And?" said Annabeth eagerly, Percy had told Annabeth and Nico about it.

"I dunno," said Harry, playing for time. He looked up at Ron.

"I thought it was a good idea from the start," said Ron, who seemed keener to join in this conversation now that he was sure Harry was not going to start shouting again.

Harry shifted uncomfortably in his chair.

"You did listen to what I said about a load of it being luck, didn't you?"

"Yes, Harry," said Hermione gently, "but all the same, there's no point pretending that you're not good at Defence Against the Dark Arts, because you are. You were the only person last year who could throw off the Imperius Curse completely, you can produce a Patronus, you can do all sorts of stuff that full-grown wizards can't, Viktor always said — "

Ron looked around at her so fast he appeared to crick his neck. Rubbing it, he said, "Yeah? What did Vicky say?"

"Ho," said Hermione in a bored voice. "He said Harry knew how to do stuff even he didn't, and he was in the final year at Durmstrang."

Ron was looking at Hermione suspiciously.

"You're not still in contact with him, are you?"

"So what if I am?" said Hermione coolly, though her face was a little pink. "I can have a pen-pal if I — "

"He didn't only want to be your pen-pal," said Ron accusingly. Percy wondered who this Viktor person was.

Annabeth ignored their bickering and turned to Harry. "Well, what do you think? Will you teach us?"

"Just you guys, yeah?"

"Well," said Hermione, looking a mite anxious again. "Well… now, don't fly off the handle again, Harry, please… but I really think you ought to teach anyone who wants to learn. I mean, we're talking about defending ourselves against V-Voldemort. Oh, don't be pathetic, Ron. It doesn't seem fair if we don't offer the chance to other people."

Harry considered this for a moment, then said, "Yeah, but I doubt anyone except you five would want to be taught by me. I'm a nutter, remember?"

"Well, I think you might be surprised how many people would be interested in hearing what you've got to say," said Hermione seriously. "Look," she leaned towards him — the others leaned forward to listen too — "you know the first weekend in October's a Hogsmeade weekend? How would it be if we tell anyone who's interested to meet us in the village, and we can talk it over?"

"Why do we have to do it outside school?" said Percy.

"Because," said Hermione, returning to the diagram of the Chinese Chomping Cabbage she was copying, "I don't think Umbridge would be very happy if she found out what we were up to."

* * *

 **Nico POV**

While most people were excited for the Hogsmeade, Nico was nervous. There was protective magic around Hogwarts that kept out the monsters, but Hogsmeade had no such protection. Nico tried to expect the worst of every situation so that he would always be ready, and it had kept him alive. Hogsmeade was just an excuse for monsters to get them. Two of the most powerful demigods in one place, there was no chance that they would have a monster free day.

The morning of the Hogsmeade visit dawned bright but windy. After breakfast, the demigods slipped past the queue of students lined up in front of Filch with their permission slips. The demigods did not need permission slips as Dumbledore had allowed them himself. They would be meeting Harry, Ron and Hermione in the Hogs Head later in the day, but they wanted to explore Hogsmeade before the meeting. Nico similarly fiddled with his skull ring that would summon his sword from the shadows.

They decided to go to Honeydukes, a place they had heard a lot of people talking about. As they entered, they saw that the shelves were stacked with strange candy-like; Bertie Bott's Every Flavour Beans; Chocolate Frogs; Fizzing Whizzbees; Skiving Snackboxes, and Acid Pops. Percy started grabbing nearly every candy, apart from the ones that sounded gross. Once his arms were full, he went over to the counter. Nico and Annabeth went over, grabbing a few things for themselves. They paid for it all, having to combine their money, and left.

They headed towards another shop that had been much talked about, Zonko's Joke Shop. Nico grabbed a few things, paid and waited with Annabeth, who had not bought anything. Percy came over a moments later and they exited the shop. It was nearly lunch, so they headed over to the Hog's Head early. They turned down a darker street, Nico ready to summon his sword at a moment's notice.

They saw a small in at the end of the street. A battered wooden sign hung from a rusty bracket over the door, with a picture on it of a wild boar's severed head, leaking blood on to the white cloth around it. The sign creaked in the wind as they approached. All three of them hesitated outside the door.

The Hog's Head bar comprised one small, dingy and very dirty room that smelled strongly of something that might have been goats. The bay windows were so encrusted with grime that very little daylight could permeate the room, which was lit instead with the stubs of candles sitting on rough wooden tables. The floor seemed at first glance to be compressed earth, though as Nico stepped on to it, he realised that there was stone beneath what seemed to be the accumulated filth of centuries.

The only occupants of the room were a man at the bar whose whole head was wrapped in dirty grey bandages, though he was still managing to gulp endless glasses of some smoking, fiery substance through a slit over his mouth; two figures shrouded in hoods sat at a table in one of the windows; a witch with a thick, black veil that fell to her toes who sat in a shadowy corner beside the fireplace, and Harry, Hermione and Ron. After scanning the room, Nico kept his eyes on the two hooded figures, watching for any sign that they were monsters.

They walked over to their friends, which they now considered the trio to be. They greeted them as they sat down

"You guys are early," Hermione said.

"It is almost noon," replied Annabeth.

"We were just about to order some butterbeer, do you want us to get some for you?" Hermione asked them.

"Yes please," Percy said. Hermione nodded and walked up to the counter to order the drinks. They sat in silence as Hermione made her way back to them.

"Everyone else should be here about now," she said as she placed the butterbeers in front of them. "Oh, look, this might be them now."

The door of the pub had opened. A thick band of dusty sunlight split the room in two for a moment and then vanished, blocked by the incoming rush of a crowd of people.

First came Neville with Dean and Lavender, who were closely followed by Parvati and Padma Patil with Cho and one of her usually-giggling girlfriends, then (on her own and looking so dreamy she might have walked in by accident) Luna Lovegood; then Katie Bell, Alicia Spinnet and Angelina Johnson, Colin and Dennis Creevey, Ernie Macmillan, Justin Finch-Fletchley, Hannah Abbott, a Hufflepuff girl; three Ravenclaw boys, Ginny, closely followed by a tall skinny blond boy with an upturned nose, bringing up the rear, Fred and George Weasley with their friend Lee Jordan.

"A couple of people?" said Harry hoarsely to Hermione. "A couple of people?"

"Yes, well, the idea seemed quite popular," said Hermione happily. "Ron, Percy, do you want to pull up some more chairs?"

The barman had frozen in the act of wiping out a glass with a rag so filthy it looked as though it had never been washed. Possibly, he had never seen his pub so full.

"Hi," said Fred, reaching the bar first and counting his companions quickly, "could we have… twenty-five Butterbeers, please?"

The barman glared at him for a moment, then, throwing down his rag irritably as though he had been interrupted in something very important, he started passing up dusty Butterbeers from under the bar.

"Cheers," said Fred, handing them out. "Cough up, everyone, I haven't got enough gold for all of these…"

Nico watched as the large chattering group took their beers from Fred and rummaged in their robes to find coins. He knew that Hermione had found a few people who wanted to come, but he had not expected this many.

"What have you been telling people?" Harry said to Hermione in a low voice. "What are they expecting?"

"I've told you, they just want to hear what you've got to say," said Hermione soothingly; but Harry continued to look at her so furiously that she added quickly, "you don't have to do anything yet, I'll speak to them first."

"Hi, Harry," said Neville, beaming and taking a seat opposite him.

In twos and threes the new arrivals settled around Nico, Annabeth, Percy, Harry, Ron and Hermione, some looking rather excited, others curious, Luna Lovegood gazing dreamily into space. When everybody had pulled up a chair, the chatter died out. Every eye was upon Harry.

"Er," said Hermione, her voice slightly higher than usual out of nerves. "Well — er — hi."

The group focused its attention on her instead, though eyes continued to dart back regularly to Harry.

"Well… erm… well, you know why you're here. Erm… well, Harry here had the idea — I mean" (Harry had thrown her a sharp look) "I had the idea — that it might be good if people who wanted to study Defence Against the Dark Arts — and I mean, really study it, you know, not the rubbish that Umbridge is doing with us — " (Hermione's voice became suddenly much stronger and more confident) " — because nobody could call that Defence Against the Dark Arts — " ("Hear, hear," said one of the Ravenclaw boys, and Hermione looked heartened) " — Well, I thought it would be good if we, well, took matters into our own hands."

She paused, looked sideways at Harry, and went on, "And by that, I mean learning how to defend ourselves properly, not just in theory but doing the real spells — "

"You want to pass your Defence Against the Dark Arts O.W.L. too, though, I bet?" said another Ravenclaw boy, who was watching her closely.

"Of course I do," said Hermione at once. "But more than that, I want to be properly trained in defence because… because…" she took a great breath and finished, "because Lord Voldemort is back."

The reaction was immediate and predictable. Cho's friend shrieked and slopped Butterbeer down herself; Terry Boot gave a kind of involuntary twitch; Padma Patil shuddered, and Neville gave an odd yelp that he managed to turn into a cough. All of them, however, looked fixedly, even eagerly, at Harry.

Nico decided this was a great time to stop listening and instead fiddle with his ring. Eventually, everyone got up and formed a line. Nico had no idea what they were doing but he followed anyway.

"Er…" said Zacharias slowly, not taking the parchment that George was trying to pass to him, "well… I'm sure Ernie will tell me when the meeting is."

But Ernie was looking rather hesitant about signing, too. Hermione raised her eyebrows at him.

"I — well, we are prefects," Ernie burst out. "And if this list was found… well, I mean to say… you said yourself, if Umbridge finds out — "

"You just said this group was the most important thing you'd do this year," Harry reminded him.

"I — yes," said Ernie, "yes, I do believe that, it's just — "

"Ernie, do you really think I'd leave that list lying around?" said Hermione testily.

"No. No, of course not," said Ernie, looking slightly less anxious. "I — yes, of course I'll sign."

Nobody raised objections after Ernie, though Nico saw Cho's friend give her a rather reproachful look before adding her own name. The demigods signed, before handing the parchment on. When the last person — Zacharias — had signed, Hermione took the parchment back and slipped it carefully into her bag. There was an odd feeling in the group now. It was as though they had just signed some kind of contract.

"Well, time's ticking on," said Fred briskly, getting to his feet. "George, Lee and I have got items of a sensitive nature to purchase, we'll be seeing you all later."

In twos and threes, the rest of the group took their leave, too. The demigods left the trio and made their way back to Hogwarts.

* * *

 **Hope you liked that chapter, it was quite a bit longer. I'm gonna try to make all of them have over 2k words. I got a lot of it from the book.**

 **I bet you thought that they would be attacked by monsters. That would be too predictable. I won't do that… not yet anyway.**

 **So, please review. I love reading them.**

 **See you next week.**


	9. Chapter 9

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything.**

* * *

 **Percy POV**

The rest of the weekend passed fairly quickly. On Sunday the demigods had joined Harry, Hermione and Ron beside the Great Lake to do their homework. Harry seemed to be in a good mood all weekend, Percy thought it must be due to how well the meeting went, but he had also seen something going on between Harry and one of the Ravenclaw girls, Cho Chang.

Monday morning came and Percy, Harry and Ron headed downstairs from their dormitory, the latter two discussing Angelina's idea that they were to work on a new move called the Sloth Grip Roll during that night's Quidditch practice, and Percy trying to block out the nightmare he had had the previous night. Not until they were halfway across the sunlit common room did they notice the addition to the room that had already attracted the attention of a small group of people.

A large sign had been affixed to the Gryffindor noticeboard; so large it covered everything else on it — the lists of secondhand spellbooks for sale, the regular reminders of school rules from Argus Filch, the Quidditch team training timetable, the offers to barter certain Chocolate Frog Cards for others, the Weasleys' latest advertisement for testers, the dates of the Hogsmeade weekends and the lost and found notices. The new sign was printed in large black letters and there was a highly official-looking seal at the bottom beside a neat and curly signature.

Percy didn't even bother reading it, but Harry and Ron read the notice over the heads of some anxious-looking second-years.

"Does this mean they're going to shut down the Gobstones Club?" one of them asked his friend.

"I reckon you'll be OK with Gobstones," Ron said darkly, making the second-year jump. "I don't think we're going to be as lucky, though, do you?" he asked Harry and Percy as the second-years hurried away.

"What does it say?"

The others read it out to him. By the end he was pissed. He was getting seriously annoyed with Umbridge, and a pissed off son of Poseidon was not something you wanted. He saw that Harry was just as annoyed.

"This isn't a coincidence," Percy said, his hands forming fists. "She knows."

"She can't," said Ron at once.

"There were people listening in that pub. And let's face it, we don't know how many of the people who turned up we can trust… any of them could have run off and told Umbridge…" said Harry.

"Zacharias Smith!" said Ron at once, punching a fist into his hand. "Or — I thought that Michael Corner had a really shifty look, too — "

"I wonder if Hermione has seen this yet?" Harry said, looking around at the door to the girls' dormitories.

"Let's go and tell her," said Ron. He bounded forwards, pulled open the door and set off up the spiral staircase.

He was on the sixth stair when there was a loud, wailing, klaxon-like sound and the steps melted together to make a long, smooth stone slide like a helter-skelter. There was a brief moment when Ron tried to keep running, arms working madly like windmills, then he toppled over backwards and shot down the newly created slide, coming to rest on his back at Harry's feet. Percy hid a grin.

"Er — I don't think we're allowed in the girls' dormitories," said Harry, pulling Ron to his feet and trying not to laugh.

Two fourth-year girls came zooming gleefully down the stone slide.

"Oooh, who tried to get upstairs?" they giggled happily, leaping to their feet and ogling Harry, Percy and Ron.

"Me," said Ron, who was still rather dishevelled. "I didn't realise that would happen. It's not fair!" he added to them, as the girls headed off for the portrait hole, still giggling madly. "The girls are allowed in our dormitory, how come we're not allowed — ?"

"Well, it's an old-fashioned rule," said Hermione, who had just slid neatly on to a rug in front of them and was now getting to her feet, "but it says in Hogwarts: A History, that the founders thought boys were less trustworthy than girls. Anyway, why were you trying to get in there?"

"To see you — look at this!" said Ron, dragging her over to the noticeboard. Her expression became stony as she read it.

"Someone must have blabbed to her!" Percy said angrily.

"They can't have done," said Hermione in a low voice.

"You're so naive," said Ron, "you think just because you're all honourable and trustworthy — "

"No, they can't have done, because I put a jinx on that piece of parchment we all signed," said Hermione grimly. "Believe me, if anyone's run off and told Umbridge, we'll know exactly who they are and they will really regret it."

"What'll happen to them?" said Ron eagerly.

"Well, put it this way," said Hermione, "it'll make Eloise Midgeon's acne look like a couple of cute freckles. Come on, let's get down to breakfast and see what the others think… I wonder whether this has been put up in all the houses?"

It was immediately apparent on entering the Great Hall that Umbridge's sign had not only appeared in Gryffindor Tower. There was a peculiar intensity about the chatter and an extra measure of movement in the Hall as people scurried up and down their tables conferring on what they had read. Annabeth and Nico came up to them.

"Did you see the notice?" Annabeth asked. Percy nodded.

"Any idea how she found out?" asked Percy.

"There were plenty of people in the Hog's Head that could have told her," answered Nico. "All of them had something over their face, any of them could have been Umbridge."

"If one of them was Umbridge, wouldn't she have busted us?" Ron said.

"She could have gotten someone else to do it," Annabeth said. "We should get back to our tables, or she might think that we're hiding something."

"I could just say that I wanted to talk to my cousin and you, your boyfriend," replied Nico.

"True," Annabeth said.

"What? Cousin?" Harry asked.

"Percy's my cousin," Nico explained. "Anyway, see you guys in class." Annabeth and Nico headed back to their tables.

They had barely taken their seats at the Gryffindor table, when Neville, Dean, Fred, George and Ginny descended upon them.

"Did you see it?"

"D'you reckon she knows?"

"What are we going to do?"

They were all looking at Harry. He glanced around to make sure there were no teachers near them.

"We're going to do it anyway of course," he said quietly.

"Knew you'd say that," said George, beaming and thumping Harry on the arm.

"The prefects as well?" said Fred, looking quizzically at Ron and Hermione.

"Of course," said Hermione coolly.

"Here come Ernie and Hannah Abbott," said Ron, looking over his shoulder. "And those Ravenclaw blokes and Smith… and no one looks very spotty."

Hermione looked alarmed.

"Never mind spots, the idiots can't come over here now, it'll look really suspicious — sit down!" she mouthed to Ernie and Hannah, gesturing frantically to them to rejoin the Hufflepuff table. "Later! We'll — talk — to — you — later!"

"I'll tell Michael," said Ginny impatiently, swinging herself off her bench, "the fool, honestly…"

She hurried off towards the Ravenclaw table.

But the full repercussions of the sign were not felt until they were leaving the Great Hall for Potions.

"Harry! Ron!"

It was Angelina and she was hurrying towards them looking perfectly desperate.

"It's OK," said Harry quietly, when she was near enough to hear him. "We're still going to — "

"You realise she's including Quidditch in this?" Angelina said over him. "We have to go and ask permission to re-form the Gryffindor team!"

"What?" said Harry.

"No way," said Ron, appalled.

"You read the sign, it mentions teams too! So listen, Harry… I am saying this for the last time… please, please don't lose your temper with Umbridge again or she might not let us play any more!"

"OK, OK," said Harry, for Angelina looked as though she was on the verge of tears. "Don't worry, I'll behave myself…"

"Bet Umbridge is in Potions," said Ron grimly, as they set off for Snape's lesson. "Two worst teachers in the same room."

Annabeth and Nico joined them and they trudged down the stone steps to the dungeons for Potions, all six of them lost in thought, but as they reached the bottom of the steps they were recalled to themselves by the voice of Draco Malfoy who was standing just outside Snape's classroom door, waving around an official-looking piece of parchment and talking much louder than was necessary so that they could hear every word.

"Yeah, Umbridge gave the Slytherin Quidditch team permission to continue playing straight away, I went to ask her first thing this morning. Well, it was pretty much automatic, I mean, she knows my father really well, he's always popping in and out of the Ministry… it'll be interesting to see whether Gryffindor is allowed to keep playing, won't it?"

"Don't rise," Hermione whispered imploringly to Harry and Ron, who were both watching Malfoy, faces set and fists clenched. Annabeth narrowed her eyes at Malfoy. "It's what he wants."

"I mean," said Malfoy, raising his voice a little more, his grey eyes glittering malevolently in Harry and Ron's direction, "if it's a question of influence with the Ministry, I don't think they've got much chance… from what my father says, they've been looking for an excuse to sack Arthur Weasley for years… and as for Potter… my father says it's a matter of time before the Ministry has him carted off to St. Mungo's… apparently they've got a special ward for people whose brains have been addled by magic."

Malfoy made a grotesque face, his mouth sagging open and his eyes rolling. Crabbe and Goyle gave their usual grunts of laughter; Pansy Parkinson shrieked with glee.

Something collided hard with Percy's shoulder, knocking him sideways. A split second later he realised that Neville had just charged past him, heading straight for Malfoy.

"Neville, no!"

Percy leapt forward and seized the back of Neville's robes; Neville struggled frantically, his fists flailing, trying desperately to get at Malfoy who looked, for a moment, extremely shocked.

"Help me!" Percy flung at Harry and Ron, managing to get an arm around Neville's neck and dragging him backwards, away from the Slytherins. Crabbe and Goyle were flexing their arms as they stepped in front of Malfoy, ready for the fight. Harry and Ron each seized one of Neville's arms, and together he, Ron and Harry succeeded in dragging Neville back into the Gryffindor line. Neville's face was scarlet; the pressure Percy was exerting on his throat rendered him quite incomprehensible, but odd words spluttered from his mouth.

"Not… funny… don't… Mungo's… show… him…"

The dungeon door opened. Snape appeared there. His black eyes swept up the Gryffindor line to the point where Percy, Harry and Ron were wrestling with Neville.

"Fighting, Jackson, Potter, Weasley, Longbottom?" Snape said in his cold, sneering voice. "Ten points from Gryffindor. Release Longbottom, Jackson, or it will be detention. Inside, all of you."

Percy let go of Neville, who stood panting and glaring at him.

"I had to stop you," Percy said, picking up his bag. "Crabbe and Goyle would've torn you apart."

Neville said nothing; he merely snatched up his own bag and stalked off into the dungeon.

"What in the name of Merlin," said Ron slowly, as they followed Neville, "was that about?"

Harry did not answer. Percy suspected that he knew exactly why Neville had acted like that. Percy didn't say anything though, it wasn't his business.

The demigods and Hermione took their usual seats at the back of the class, pulled out parchment, quills and their copies of One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi. The class around them was whispering about what Neville had just done, but when Snape closed the dungeon door with an echoing bang, everybody immediately fell silent.

"You will notice," said Snape, in his low, sneering voice, "that we have a guest with us today."

He gestured towards the dim corner of the dungeon and Percy saw Umbridge sitting there, clipboard on her knee. He glanced sideways at the others, his eyebrows raised.

"We are continuing with our Strengthening Solution today. You will find your mixtures as you left them last lesson; if correctly made they should have matured well over the weekend — instructions — " he waved his wand again " — on the board. Carry on."

Umbridge spent the first half-hour of the lesson making notes in her corner. Percy thought it would be interesting hearing her question Snape. Then Umbridge got to her feet.

"Ha," he said softly, as she strode between two lines of desks towards Snape, who was bending over Dean Thomas's cauldron.

"Well, the class seem fairly advanced for their level," she said briskly to Snape's back. "Though I would question whether it is advisable to teach them a potion like the Strengthening Solution. I think the Ministry would prefer it if that was removed from the syllabus."

Snape straightened up slowly and turned to look at her.

"Now… how long have you been teaching at Hogwarts?" she asked, her quill poised over her clipboard.

"Fourteen years," Snape replied. His expression was unfathomable.

"You applied first for the Defence Against the Dark Arts post, I believe?" Umbridge asked Snape.

"Yes," said Snape quietly.

"But you were unsuccessful?"

Snape's lip curled.

"Obviously."

Umbridge scribbled on her clipboard.

"And you have applied regularly for the Defence Against the Dark Arts post since you first joined the school, I believe?"

"Yes," said Snape quietly, barely moving his lips. He looked very angry.

"Do you have any idea why Dumbledore has consistently refused to appoint you?" asked Umbridge.

"I suggest you ask him," said Snape jerkily.

"Oh, I shall," said Umbridge, with a sweet smile.

"I suppose this is relevant?" Snape asked, his black eyes narrowed.

"Oh yes," said Umbridge, "yes, the Ministry wants a thorough understanding of teachers' — er — backgrounds."

She turned away, walked over to Pansy Parkinson and began questioning her about the lessons. Snape looked around at Harry, who's potion was now congealing foully and giving off a strong smell of burned rubber.

"No marks again, then, Potter," said Snape maliciously, emptying Harry's cauldron with a wave of his wand. "You will write me an essay on the correct composition of this potion, indicating how and why you went wrong, to be handed in next lesson, do you understand?"

"Yes," said Harry furiously. Percy felt bad for him, Snape really seemed to have some kind of grudge against him. He wondered what Harry had done that was so bad.

When Potions finished they headed to Divination, which was boring. After that, they headed to their History of Magic class, where Binns continued his monotonous drone on giant wars. Percy did not even attempt to follow what he was saying today; he doodled idly on his parchment ignoring Annabeth's frequent glares and nudges.

"Oh, I've always loved that owl, she's so beautiful," Percy suddenly heard Lavender sigh to Parvati.

He glanced round until he saw Harry's owl on the windowsill. He saw that Annabeth had already noticed. Harry slipped quietly off his chair, crouched down and hurried along the row to the window, where he slid the catch and opened it very slowly.

The moment Harry opened window wide enough she hopped inside, hooting dolefully. Harry closed the window with an anxious glance at Professor Binns, crouched low again and sped back to his seat with Hedwig on his shoulder. He regained his seat, transferred Hedwig to his lap and made to remove the letter tied to her leg.

Percy saw that her Hedwig's feathers were oddly ruffled; some were bent the wrong way, and she was holding one of her wings at an odd angle.

"She's hurt!" Percy heard Harry whisper to Ron and Hermione, bending his head low over her. Hermione and Ron leaned in closer; Hermione even put down her quill. "Look — there's something wrong with her wing — "

Hedwig was quivering; when Harry made to touch the wing she gave a little jump, all her feathers on end as though she was inflating herself, and gazed at him reproachfully.

"Professor Binns," said Harry loudly, and everyone else in the class turned to look at him. "I'm not feeling well."

Binns raised his eyes from his notes, looking amazed, as always, to find the room in front of him full of people."Not feeling well?" he repeated hazily.

"Not at all well," said Harry firmly getting to his feet with Hedwig concealed behind his back. "I think I need to go to the hospital wing."

"Yes," said Binns, clearly very much wrong-footed. "Yes… yes, hospital wing… well, off you go, then, Perkins…"

Harry left the room and the class went back to the boring lecture.

* * *

 **I hope you liked that chapter. I'm gonna be following the book a lot from now on. I'll add in little demigod bits and stuff, but for now, it will mainly just be classes and Umbridge and that kind of stuff. But please keep reading, it will still be interesting. I will try to change it so it's not all the same as the book.**

 **Please review, I love reading them.**

 **Anyway, see you next week.**


	10. Chapter 10

**Disclaimer: No one even reads these, I don't know why I bother. I don't own everything.**

* * *

 **Percy POV**

"No Quidditch practice," said Angelina in hollow tones when Percy, Harry, Ron and Hermione entered the common room after dinner that night.

"But I kept my temper!" said Harry, horrified. "I didn't say anything to her, Angelina, I swear, I — "

"I know, I know," said Angelina miserably. "She just said she needed a bit of time to consider."

"Consider what?" said Ron angrily. "She's given the Slytherins permission, why not us?"

But Percy could imagine how much Umbridge was enjoying holding the threat of no Gryffindor Quidditch team over their heads and could easily understand why she would not want to relinquish that weapon over them too soon.

"Well," said Hermione, "look on the bright side — at least now you'll have time to do Snape's essay!"

"That's a bright side, is it?" snapped Harry, while Ron stared incredulously at Hermione. "No Quidditch practice, and extra Potions?"

Harry slumped down into a chair, dragged his Potions essay reluctantly from his bag and set to work. The others joined him. Percy saw Harry glance at him then at the fire. Ron's twin brothers, Fred and George, appeared finally to have perfected one type of Skiving Snackbox, which they were taking turns to demonstrate to a cheering and whooping crowd.

First, one of them would take a bite out of the orange end of a chew, at which he would vomit spectacularly into a bucket they had placed in front of them. Then he would force down the purple end of the chew, at which the vomiting would immediately cease. Their friend, Lee Jordan, who was assisting the demonstration, was lazily Vanishing the vomit at regular intervals with the same Vanishing Spell Snape kept using on Harry's potions.

"Just go and stop them, then!" Harry said suddenly.

"I can't, they're not technically doing anything wrong," said Hermione through gritted teeth. "They're quite within their rights to eat the foul things themselves and I can't find a rule that says the other idiots aren't entitled to buy them, not unless they're proven to be dangerous in some way and it doesn't look as though they are."

They all watched George projectile-vomit into the bucket, gulp down the rest of the chew and straighten up, beaming with his arms wide to protracted applause.

"You know, I don't get why Fred and George only got three O.W.L.s each," said Harry, watching as Fred, George and Lee collected gold from the eager crowd. "They really know their stuff."

"Oh, they only know flashy stuff that's of no real use to anyone," said Hermione disparagingly.

"No real use?" said Ron in a strained voice. "Hermione, they've made about twenty-six Galleons already."

It was only a little while later that Percy gave up on his homework and, after saying good night to them, made his way to his dorm. The other boys in his dorm were already asleep, except Harry and Ron, who were still in the common room, so Percy quietly got ready for bed.

As soon as he slipped into unconsciousness, the nightmares started. He was in Tartarus again. The Arai surrounded him. This was the most frequent nightmare. Annabeth was blindly calling for him. He felt the curses of the Arai take effect, pain filling his body. He tried to reach Annabeth but he didn't have the strength and every time he got close to her, she seemed to get further away. He called for her. More Arai came as he killed them, more curses were inflicted on him. He screamed. He couldn't stop it. He collapsed, ready for death. But death didn't come. The pain just kept going on.

"Percy! Percy, wake up!"

At first, he didn't notice the voice, but then he felt shaking that wasn't coming from himself. He opened his eyes, sitting up violently. Dean, Seamus and Neville were standing above him, looking worried.

"Percy, are you alright, mate?" Neville asked nervously. Percy's brain was still recovering from the nightmare. He nodded silently, wishing they would leave him alone. Gods, he wished Annabeth was here. Not only to comfort him but also to comfort her from the inevitable nightmares.

"I'm fine. Sorry for waking you," Percy said as he closed the curtains around his bed. The other boys shot him one last worried look before going back to their own beds. Harry and Ron came in about an hour after the nightmare. Percy lay awake for the rest of the night, only dozing off fitfully a couple of times.

* * *

 **Harry POV**

Harry heard a scream come from his dorm. Though it had happened frequently throughout the last few weeks, Harry still had not gotten used to the screams that would come from Percy. The screams were worse than anything he had ever heard.

Just after the screaming stopped, Ron, who was dozing lightly in an armchair, gave a muffled grunt, awoke, and looked blearily into the fire.

"Sirius!" he said.

Harry whipped around. Sirius's untidy dark head was sitting in the fire again.

"Hi," he said, grinning.

"Hi," chorused Harry, Ron and Hermione, all three kneeling down on the hearthrug. Crookshanks purred loudly and approached the fire, trying, despite the heat, to put his face close to Sirius's.

"How're things?" said Sirius.

"Not that good," said Harry, as Hermione pulled Crookshanks back to stop him singeing his whiskers. "The Ministry's forced through another decree, which means we're not allowed to have Quidditch teams — "

"Or secret Defence Against the Dark Arts groups?" said Sirius.

There was a short pause.

"How did you know about that?" Harry demanded.

"You want to choose your meeting places more carefully," said Sirius, grinning still more broadly. "The Hog's Head, I ask you."

"Well, it was better than the Three Broomsticks!" said Hermione defensively. "That's always packed with people — "

"Which means you'd have been harder to overhear," said Sirius. "You've got a lot to learn, Hermione."

"Who overheard us?" Harry demanded.

"Mundungus, of course," said Sirius, and when they all looked puzzled he laughed. "He was the witch under the veil."

"That was Mundungus?" Harry said, stunned. "What was he doing in the Hog's Head?"

"What do you think he was doing?" said Sirius impatiently. "Keeping an eye on you, of course."

"I'm still being followed?" asked Harry angrily.

"Yeah, you are," said Sirius, "and just as well, isn't it, if the first thing you're going to do on your weekend off is organise an illegal defence group."

But he looked neither angry nor worried. On the contrary, he was looking at Harry with distinct pride.

"Why was Dung hiding from us?" asked Ron, sounding disappointed. "We'd've liked to've seen him."

"He was banned from the Hog's Head twenty years ago," said Sirius, "and that barman's got a long memory. We lost Moody's spare Invisibility Cloak when Sturgis was arrested, so Dung's been dressing as a witch a lot lately… anyway… first of all, Ron — I've sworn to pass on a message from your mother."

"Oh yeah?" said Ron, sounding apprehensive.

"She says on no account whatsoever are you to take part in an illegal secret Defence Against the Dark Arts group. She says you'll be expelled for sure and your future will be ruined. She says there will be plenty of time to learn how to defend yourself later and that you are too young to be worrying about that right now. She also" (Sirius's eyes turned to the other two) "advises Harry and Hermione not to proceed with the group, though she accepts that she has no authority over either of them and simply begs them to remember that she has their best interests at heart. She would have written all this to you, but if the owl had been intercepted you'd all have been in real trouble, and she can't say it for herself because she's on duty tonight."

"On duty doing what?" said Ron quickly.

"Never you mind, just stuff for the Order," said Sirius. "So it's fallen to me to be the messenger and make sure you tell her I passed it all on because I don't think she trusts me to."

There was another pause in which Crookshanks, mewing, attempted to paw Sirius's head, and Ron fiddled with a hole in the hearthrug.

"So, you want me to say I'm not going to take part in the Defence group?" he muttered finally.

"Me? Certainly not!" said Sirius, looking surprised. "I think it's an excellent idea!"

"You do?" said Harry, his heart lifting.

"Of course I do!" said Sirius. "D'you think your father and I would've lain down and taken orders from an old hag like Umbridge?"

"But — last term all you did was tell me to be careful and not take risks — "

"Last year, all the evidence was that someone inside Hogwarts was trying to kill you, Harry!" said Sirius impatiently. "This year, we know there's someone outside Hogwarts who'd like to kill us all, so I think learning to defend yourselves properly is a very good idea!"

"And if we do get expelled?" Hermione asked, a quizzical look on her face.

"Hermione, this whole thing was your idea!" said Harry, staring at her.

"I know it was. I just wondered what Sirius thought," she said, shrugging.

"Well, better expelled and able to defend yourselves than sitting safely in school without a clue," said Sirius.

"Hear, hear," said Harry and Ron enthusiastically.

"So," said Sirius, "how are you organising this group? Where are you meeting?"

"Well, that's a bit of a problem now," said Harry. "Dunno where we're going to be able to go."

"How about the Shrieking Shack?" suggested Sirius.

"Hey, that's an idea!" said Ron excitedly, but Hermione made a sceptical noise and all three of them looked at her, Sirius's head turning in the flames.

"Well, Sirius, it's just that there were only four of you meeting in the Shrieking Shack when you were at school," said Hermione, "and all of you could transform into animals and I suppose you could all have squeezed under a single Invisibility Cloak if you'd wanted to. But there are twenty-eight of us and none of us is an Animagus, so we wouldn't need so much an Invisibility Cloak as an Invisibility Marquee — "

"Fair point," said Sirius, looking slightly crestfallen. "Well, I'm sure you'll come up with somewhere. There used to be a pretty roomy secret passageway behind that big mirror on the fourth floor, you might have enough space to practise jinxes in there."

"Fred and George told me it's blocked," said Harry, shaking his head. "Caved in or something."

"Oh…" said Sirius, frowning. "Well, I'll have a think and get back to — "

He broke off. His face was suddenly tense, alarmed. He turned sideways, apparently looking into the solid brick wall of the fireplace.

"Sirius?" said Harry anxiously.

But he had vanished. Harry gaped at the flames for a moment, then turned to look at Ron and Hermione.

"Why did he — ?"

Hermione gave a horrified gasp and leapt to her feet, still staring at the fire.

A hand had appeared amongst the flames, groping as though to catch hold of something; a stubby, short-fingered hand covered in ugly old-fashioned rings.

The three of them ran for it. At the door of the boys' dormitory, Harry looked back. Umbridge's hand was still making snatching movements amongst the flames, as though she knew exactly where Sirius's hair had been moments before and was determined to seize it.

* * *

 **Harry POV**

When Harry and Ron got back from their extremely wet Quidditch practice, it appeared that Percy and Hermione had gone to bed early. Harry was rather grateful that Hermione was not around, because he did not much want to discuss his scar hurting and have her urge him to go to Dumbledore, too.

Harry pulled out his Charms books and set to work on finishing his essay, though he was only pretending to concentrate and by the time Ron said he was going up to bed, he had written hardly anything.

Midnight came and went while Harry was reading and rereading a passage about the uses of scurvy-grass, lovage and sneezewort and not taking in a word of it.

These plants are most efficacious in the inflaming of the brain, and are therefore much used in Confusing and Befuddlement Draughts, where the wizard is desirous of producing hot-headedness and recklessness…

…Hermione said Sirius was becoming reckless cooped up in Grimmauld Place…

…most efficacious in the inflaming of the brain, and are therefore much used…

…the Daily Prophet would think his brain was inflamed if they found out that he knew what Voldemort was feeling…

…therefore much used in Confusing and Befuddlement Draughts…

…confusing was the word, all right; why did he know what Voldemort was feeling? What was this weird connection between them, which Dumbledore had never been able to explain satisfactorily?

…where the wizard is desirous…

…how Harry would like to sleep…

…of producing hot-headedness…

…it was warm and comfortable in his armchair before the fire, with the rain still beating heavily on the windowpanes, Crookshanks purring, and the crackling of the flames…

The book slipped from Harry's slack grip and landed with a dull thud on the hearthrug. His head lolled sideways…

He was walking along a windowless corridor, his footsteps echoing in the silence. As the door at the end of the passage loomed larger, his heartbeat fast with excitement… if he could only open it… enter beyond…

He stretched out his hand… his fingertips were inches from it…

"Harry Potter, sir!"

He awoke with a start. The candles had all been extinguished in the common room, but there was something moving close by.

"Whozair?" said Harry, sitting upright in his chair. The fire was almost out, the room very dark.

"Dobby has your owl, sir!" said a squeaky voice.

"Dobby?" said Harry thickly, peering through the gloom towards the source of the voice.

Dobby the house-elf was standing beside the table on which Hermione had left half a dozen of her knitted hats. His large, pointed ears were now sticking out from beneath what looked like all the hats Hermione had ever knitted; he was wearing one on top of the other so that his head seemed elongated by two or three feet, and on the very topmost bobble sat Hedwig, hooting serenely and obviously cured.

"Dobby volunteered to return Harry Potter's owl," said the elf squeakily, with a look of positive adoration on his face. "Professor Grubbly-Plank says she is all well now, sir." He sank into a deep bow so that his pencil-like nose brushed the threadbare surface of the hearthrug and Hedwig gave an indignant hoot and fluttered on to the arm of Harry's chair.

"Thanks, Dobby!" said Harry, stroking Hedwig's head and blinking hard, trying to rid himself of the image of the door in his dream… it had been very vivid. Surveying Dobby more closely, he noticed that the elf was also wearing several scarves and innumerable socks so that his feet looked far too big for his body.

"Er… have you been taking all the clothes Hermione's been leaving out?"

"Oh, no, sir," said Dobby happily. "Dobby has been taking some for Winky, too, sir."

"Yeah, how is Winky?" asked Harry.

Dobby's ears drooped slightly.

"Winky is still drinking lots, sir," he said sadly, his enormous round green eyes, large as tennis balls, downcast. "She still does not care for clothes, Harry Potter. Nor do the other house-elves. None of them will clean Gryffindor Tower any more, not with the hats and socks hidden everywhere, they finds them insulting, sir. Dobby does it all himself, sir, but Dobby does not mind, sir, for he always hopes to meet Harry Potter and tonight, sir, he has got his wish!" Dobby sank into a deep bow again. "But Harry Potter does not seem happy," Dobby went on, straightening up again and looking timidly at Harry. "Dobby heard him muttering in his sleep. Was Harry Potter having bad dreams?"

"Not really bad," said Harry, yawning and rubbing his eyes. "I've had worse."

The elf surveyed Harry out of his vast, orb-like eyes. Then he said very seriously, his ears drooping, "Dobby wishes he could help Harry Potter, for Harry Potter set Dobby free and Dobby is much, much happier now."

Harry smiled.

"You can't help me, Dobby, but thanks for the offer."

He bent and picked up his Potions book. He'd have to try to finish the essay tomorrow. He closed the book and as he did so the firelight illuminated the thin white scars on the back of his hand — the result of his detentions with Umbridge…

"Wait a moment — there is something you can do for me, Dobby," said Harry slowly.

The elf looked around, beaming.

"Name it, Harry Potter, sir!"

"I need to find a place where twenty-eight people can practise Defence Against the Dark Arts without being discovered by any of the teachers. Especially," Harry clenched his hand on the book, so that the scars shone pearly white, "Professor Umbridge."

He expected the elf's smile to vanish, his ears to droop; he expected him to say it was impossible, or else that he would try to find somewhere, but his hopes were not high. What he had not expected was for Dobby to give a little skip, his ears waggling cheerfully, and clap his hands together.

"Dobby knows the perfect place, sir!" he said happily. "Dobby heard tell of it from the other house-elves when he came to Hogwarts, sir. It is known by us as the Come and Go Room, sir, or else as the Room of Requirement!"

"Why?" said Harry curiously.

"Because it is a room that a person can only enter," said Dobby seriously, "when they have real need of it. Sometimes it is there, and sometimes it is not, but when it appears, it is always equipped for the seeker's needs. Dobby has used it, sir," said the elf, dropping his voice and looking guilty, "when Winky has been very drunk; he has hidden her in the Room of Requirement and he has found antidotes to Butterbeer there, and a nice elf-sized bed to settle her on while she sleeps it off, sir… and Dobby knows Mr Filch has found extra cleaning materials there when he has run short, sir, and — "

"And if you really needed a bathroom," said Harry, suddenly remembering something Dumbledore had said at the Yule Ball the previous Christmas, "would it fill itself with chamber pots?"

"Dobby expects so, sir," said Dobby, nodding earnestly. "It is the most amazing room, sir."

"How many people know about it?" said Harry, sitting up straighter in his chair.

"Very few, sir. Mostly people stumbles across it when they needs it, sir, but often they never finds it again, for they do not know that it is always there waiting to be called into service, sir."

"It sounds brilliant," said Harry, his heart racing. "It sounds perfect, Dobby. When can you show me where it is?"

"Any time, Harry Potter, sir," said Dobby, looking delighted at Harry's enthusiasm. "We could go now, if you like!"

For a moment Harry was tempted to go with Dobby. He was halfway out of his seat, intending to hurry upstairs for his Invisibility Cloak when, not for the first time, a voice very much like Hermione's whispered in his ear: reckless. It was, after all, very late, he was exhausted, and had Snape's essay to finish.

"Not tonight, Dobby," said Harry reluctantly, sinking back into his chair. This is really important… I don't want to blow it, it'll need proper planning. Listen, can you just tell me exactly where this Room of Requirement is, and how to get in there?"

* * *

 **I hope you liked that chapter.**

 **Not much to say, so please review, I love reading them.**

 **See you next week.**


	11. Chapter 11

**Disclaimer: I'm not JK Rowling or Uncle Rick, therefore I do not own anything. Still working on it.**

* * *

 **Harry POV**

Their robes billowed and swirled around them as they splashed across the flooded vegetable patch to double Herbology, where they could hardly hear what Professor Sprout was saying over the hammering of raindrops hard as hailstones on the greenhouse roof. The afternoon's Care of Magical Creatures lesson was to be relocated from the storm-swept grounds to a free classroom on the ground floor and, to their intense relief, Angelina had sought out her team at lunch to tell them that Quidditch practise was cancelled.

"Good," said Harry quietly, when she told him, "because we've found somewhere to have our first Defence meeting. Tonight, eight o'clock, seventh floor opposite that tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy being clubbed by those trolls. Can you tell Katie and Alicia?"

She looked slightly taken aback but promised to tell the others. Harry returned hungrily to his sausages and mash. When he looked up to take a drink of pumpkin juice, he found Hermione watching him.

"What?" he said thickly.

"Well… it's just that Dobby's plans aren't always that safe. Don't you remember when he lost you all the bones in your arm?"

"This room isn't just some mad idea of Dobby's; Dumbledore knows about it, too, he mentioned it to me at the Yule Ball."

Hermione's expression cleared. "Dumbledore told you about it?"

"Just in passing," said Harry, shrugging.

"Oh, well, that's all right then," said Hermione briskly and raised no more objections.

Together with Ron, they had spent most of the day seeking out those people who had signed their names to the list in the Hog's Head and telling them where to meet that evening. Somewhat to Harry's disappointment, it was Ginny who managed to find Cho Chang and her friend first; however, by the end of dinner, he was confident that the news had been passed to every one of the twenty-five people who had turned up in the Hog's Head.

At half-past seven Harry, Ron and Hermione left the Gryffindor common room, Harry clutching a certain piece of aged parchment in his hand. Fifth-years were allowed to be out in the corridors until nine o'clock, but all three of them kept looking around nervously as they made their way along the seventh floor.

"Hold it," Harry warned, unfolding the piece of parchment at the top of the last staircase, tapping it with his wand and muttering, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good."

A map of Hogwarts appeared on the blank surface of the parchment. Tiny black moving dots, labelled with names, showed where various people were.

"Filch is on the second floor," said Harry, holding the map close to his eyes, "and Mrs Norris is on the fourth."

"And Umbridge?" said Hermione anxiously.

"In her office," said Harry, pointing. "OK, let's go."

They hurried along the corridor to the place Dobby had described to Harry, a stretch of blank wall opposite an enormous tapestry depicting Barnabas the Barmy's foolish attempt to train trolls for the ballet.

"OK," said Harry quietly, while a moth-eaten troll paused in his relentless clubbing of the would-be ballet teacher to watch them. "Dobby said to walk past this bit of wall three times, concentrating hard on what we need."

They did so, turning sharply at the window just beyond the blank stretch of wall, then at the man-sized vase on its other side. Ron had screwed up his eyes in concentration; Hermione was whispering something under her breath; Harry's fists were clenched as he stared ahead of him.

We need somewhere to learn to fight… he thought. Just give us a place to practise… somewhere they can't find us…

"Harry!" said Hermione sharply, as they wheeled around after their third walk past.

A highly polished door had appeared in the wall. Ron was staring at it, looking slightly wary. Harry reached out, seized the brass handle, pulled open the door and led the way into a spacious room lit with flickering torches like those that illuminated the dungeons eight floors below.

The walls were lined with wooden bookcases and instead of chairs, there were large silk cushions on the floor. A set of shelves at the far end of the room carried a range of instruments such as Sneakoscopes, Secrecy Sensors and a large, cracked Foe-Glass that Harry was sure had hung, the previous year, in the fake Moody's office.

"These will be good when we're practising Stunning," said Ron enthusiastically, prodding one of the cushions with his foot.

"And just look at these books!" said Hermione excitedly, running a finger along the spines of the large leather-bound tomes. "A Compendium of Common Curses and their Counter-Actions… The Dark Arts Outsmarted… Self-Defensive Spellwork… wow…" She looked around at Harry, her face glowing, and he saw that the presence of hundreds of books had finally convinced Hermione that what they were doing was right. "Harry, this is wonderful, there's everything we need here!"

And without further ado, she slid Jinxes for the Jinxed from its shelf, sank on to the nearest cushion and began to read.

There was a gentle knock on the door. Harry looked around. Nico, Percy, Annabeth, Ginny, Neville, Lavender, Parvati and Dean had arrived. Annabeth immediately ran over to the bookcases and started reading one of the books.

"Whoa," said Dean, staring around, impressed. "What is this place?"

Harry began to explain, but before he had finished more people had arrived and he had to start all over again. By the time eight o'clock arrived, every cushion was occupied. Harry moved across to the door and turned the key protruding from the lock; it clicked in a satisfyingly loud way and everybody fell silent, looking at him. Hermione and Annabeth put down their books.

"Well," said Harry, slightly nervously. "This is the place we've found for practice sessions, and you've — er — obviously found it OK."

"It's fantastic!" said Cho, and several people murmured their agreement.

"It's bizarre," said Fred, frowning around at it. "We once hid from Filch in here, remember, George? But it was just a broom cupboard then."

"Hey, Harry, what's this stuff?" asked Dean from the rear of the room, indicating the Sneakoscopes and the Foe-Glass.

"Dark detectors," said Harry, stepping between the cushions to reach them. "Basically they all show when Dark wizards or enemies are around, but you don't want to rely on them too much, they can be fooled…"

He gazed for a moment into the cracked Foe-Glass; shadowy figures were moving around inside it, though none was recognisable. He turned his back on it.

"Well, I've been thinking about the sort of stuff we ought to do first and — er — " He noticed a raised hand. "What, Hermione?"

"I think we ought to elect a leader," said Hermione.

"Harry's leader," said Cho at once, looking at Hermione as though she were mad.

Harry's stomach did yet another back-flip.

"Yes, but I think we ought to vote on it properly," said Hermione, unperturbed. "It makes it formal and it gives him authority. So — everyone who thinks Harry ought to be our leader?"

Everybody put up their hand, even Zacharias Smith, though he did it very half-heartedly.

"Er — right, thanks," said Harry, who could feel his face burning. "And — what, Hermione?"

"I also think we ought to have a name," she said brightly, her hand still in the air. "It would promote a feeling of team spirit and unity, don't you think?"

"Can we be the Anti-Umbridge League?" said Percy.

"Or the Ministry of Magic are Morons Group?" suggested Fred.

"I was thinking," said Hermione, frowning at Fred, "more of a name that didn't tell everyone what we were up to, so we can refer to it safely outside meetings."

"The Defence Association?" said Annabeth. "The D.A. for short, so nobody knows what we're talking about?"

"Yeah, the D.A.'s good," said Ginny. "Only let's make it stand for Dumbledore's Army because that's the Ministry's worst fear, isn't it?"

There was a good deal of appreciative murmuring and laughter at this.

"All in favour of the D.A.?" said Hermione bossily, kneeling up on her cushion to count. "That's a majority — motion passed!"

She pinned the piece of parchment with all of their signatures on it on to the wall and wrote across the top in large letters:

DUMBLEDORE'S ARMY

"Right," said Harry, when she had sat down again, "shall we get practising then? I was thinking, the first thing we should do is Expelliarmus, you know, the Disarming Charm. I know it's pretty basic but I've found it really useful — "

"Oh, please," said Zacharias Smith, rolling his eyes and folding his arms. "I don't think Expelliarmus is exactly going to help us against You-Know-Who, do you?"

"I've used it against him," said Harry quietly. "It saved my life in June."

Smith opened his mouth stupidly. The rest of the room was very quiet.

"But if you think it's beneath you, you can leave," Harry said.

Smith did not move. Nor did anybody else.

"OK," said Harry, his mouth slightly drier than usual with all these eyes upon him, "I reckon we should all divide into pairs and practise."

It felt very odd to be issuing instructions, but not nearly as odd as seeing them followed.

Everybody got to their feet at once and divided up.

"Right — on the count of three, then — one, two, three — "

The room was suddenly full of shouts of Expelliarmus. Wands flew in all directions; missed spells hit books on shelves and sent them flying into the air.

Glancing around, he thought he had been right to suggest they practise the basics first; there was a lot of shoddy spellwork going on; many people were not succeeding in Disarming their opponents at all, but merely causing them to jump back a few paces or wince as their feeble spell whooshed over them.

Harry moved off into the middle of the room. Something very odd was happening to Zacharias Smith. Every time he opened his mouth to disarm Anthony Goldstein, his own wand would fly out of his hand, yet Anthony did not seem to be making a sound. Harry did not have to look far to solve the mystery: Fred and George were several feet from Smith and taking it in turns to point their wands at his back.

"Sorry, Harry," said George hastily, when Harry caught his eye. "Couldn't resist."

Harry walked around the other pairs, trying to correct those who were doing the spell wrong. Ginny was teamed with Michael Corner; she was doing very well, whereas Michael was either very bad or unwilling to jinx her. Ernie Macmillan was flourishing his wand unnecessarily, giving his partner time to get in under his guard; the Creevey brothers were enthusiastic but erratic and mainly responsible for all the books leaping off the shelves around them; Luna Lovegood was similarly patchy, occasionally sending Justin Finch-Fletchley's wand spinning out of his hand, at other times merely causing his hair to stand on end.

Percy had paired up with Annabeth and Nico had ended up with Neville, which neither looked particularly happy about. Annabeth easily disarmed Percy, but Percy was having more trouble. Nico had managed to do the spell and, as Neville attempted the spell on him, he watched Percy's attempts at it, laughing every time Percy failed. Neville finally managed to do it when Nico was distracted by Percy's latest fail. Eventually, Percy succeeded in making Annabeth's wand fly out of her hand. He smirked at his cousin.

"OK, stop!" Harry shouted. "Stop! STOP!"

 _I need a whistle_ , he thought, and immediately spotted one lying on top of the nearest row of books. He caught it up and blew hard. Everyone lowered their wands.

"That wasn't bad," said Harry, "but there's definite room for improvement." Zacharias Smith glared at him. "Let's try again."

He moved off around the room again, stopping here and there to make suggestions. Slowly, the general performance improved.

He avoided going near Cho and her friend for a while, but after walking twice around every other pair in the room felt he could not ignore them any longer.

"Oh no," said Cho rather wildly as he approached. "Expelliarmious! I mean, Expellimellius! I — oh, sorry, Marietta!"

Her curly-haired friend's sleeve had caught fire; Marietta extinguished it with her own wand and glared at Harry as though it was his fault.

"You made me nervous, I was doing all right before then!" Cho told Harry ruefully.

"That was quite good," Harry lied, but when she raised her eyebrows he said, "Well, no, it was lousy, but I know you can do it properly, I was watching from over there."

She laughed. Her friend Marietta looked at them rather sourly and turned away.

"Don't mind her," Cho muttered. "She doesn't really want to be here but I made her come with me. Her parents have forbidden her to do anything that might upset Umbridge. You see — her mum works for the Ministry."

"What about your parents?" asked Harry.

"Well, they've forbidden me to get on the wrong side of Umbridge, too," said Cho, drawing herself up proudly. "But if they think I'm not going to fight You-Know-Who after what happened to Cedric — "

She broke off, looking rather confused, and an awkward silence fell between them; Terry Boot's wand went whizzing past Harry's ear and hit Alicia Spinnet hard on the nose.

"Well, my dad is very supportive of any anti-Ministry action!" said Luna Lovegood proudly from just behind Harry; evidently she had been eavesdropping on his conversation while Justin Finch-Fletchley attempted to disentangle himself from the robes that had flown up over his head. "He's always saying he'd believe anything of Fudge; I mean, the number of goblins Fudge has had assassinated! And of course, he uses the Department of Mysteries to develop terrible poisons, which he secretly feeds to anybody who disagrees with him. And then there's his Umgubular Slashkilter — "

"Don't ask," Harry muttered to Cho as she opened her mouth, looking puzzled. She giggled.

"Hey, Harry," Hermione called from the other end of the room, "have you checked the time?"

He looked down at his watch and was shocked to see it was already ten past nine, which meant they needed to get back to their common rooms immediately or risk being caught and punished by Filch for being out of bounds. He blew his whistle; everybody stopped shouting "Expelliarmus" and the last couple of wands clattered to the floor.

"Well, that was pretty good," said Harry, "but we've overrun, we'd better leave it here. Same time, same place next week?"

"Sooner!" said Dean Thomas eagerly and many people nodded in agreement.

Angelina, however, said quickly, "The Quidditch season's about to start, we need team practices too!"

"Let's say next Wednesday night, then," said Harry, "we can decide on additional meetings then. Come on, we'd better get going."

He pulled out the Marauder's Map again and checked it carefully for signs of teachers on the seventh floor. He let them all leave in threes and fours, watching their tiny dots anxiously to see that they returned safely to their dormitories: the Hufflepuffs to the basement corridor that also led to the kitchens; the Ravenclaws to a tower on the west side of the castle, and the Gryffindors along the corridor to the Fat Lady's portrait.

"That was really, really good, Harry," said Annabeth, when finally it was just her, Harry, Ron, Hermione, Percy and Nico who were left.

"Yeah, it was!" said Ron enthusiastically, as they slipped out of the door and watched it melt back into stone behind them. "Did you see me disarm Hermione, Harry?"

"Only once," said Hermione, stung. "I got you loads more than you got me — "

"I did not only get you once, I got you at least three times — "

"Well, if you're counting the one where you tripped over your own feet and knocked the wand out of my hand — "

They argued all the way back to the common room, Annabeth and Nico having already left them, but Harry was not listening to them. He had one eye on the Marauder's Map, but he was also thinking of Cho saying he made her nervous.

* * *

 **Nico POV**

The weekend once again arrived with a trip to Hogsmeade. The three demigods had spent most of the morning at the Three Broomsticks with Harry, Ron and Hermione. They had a butterbeer and talked, before heading back to Hogwarts. The road was deserted, most of the students were still at Hogsmeade.

As they made their way back to Hogwarts, something felt wrong. It took Nico half a second to realise why. He turned around, and there, coming towards them, were three empousa, four hell-hounds and Percy's best friend, the minotaur. Nico summoned his sword from the shadows just as the others turned around. Percy took Riptide out of his pocket and uncapped it and Annabeth pulled out her cleverly concealed knife.

"Annabeth, take the hell-hounds, and Nico, the empousa. I've got the minotaur."

Percy ran at his old foe, while the others went to take care of the other monsters. Nico ran at the empousa, making an overhead cut at the first one. She dodged, though his sword still nicked her on the shoulder, not enough to do much damage. As he continued fighting them, he caught a glimpse of his friends.

Annabeth had killed two of the hell-hounds. She dodged as one tried to bite her, she slashed at it and it exploded into golden dust. Percy was still battling the minotaur, though he was clearly winning.

Nico stabbed one of the empousa in the stomach and it exploded. He moved onto the next one when a thought occurred to him; _the followers of Hecate!_ The said witch and wizards were staring at them in shock. _Shit_ , thought Nico. _There's no way we'll be able to pass this off._

As Nico was distracted, the empousa managed to disarm him. He placed a hand on the ground and a crack appeared, ten skeletons crawled out of it. Instantly, Nico felt exhausted. He could feel his strength deserting him. He struggled to stay conscious. The empousa had defeated most of the skeletons, leaving only two left. As he watched, they too were ripped apart. The empousa made their way towards him, one still carrying his sword, and he knew it was over. As they got close, one hit him in the head with the pommel of his sword and everything went black.

* * *

 **I hope you liked that chapter.**

 **Please review.**

 **See you next week.**


	12. Chapter 12

**Disclaimer: I don't think anyone even reads this. I don't own it.**

* * *

 **Hermione POV**

They were on their way back to Hogwarts with the Americans. Everything was going fine until Nico suddenly turned around, a sword seemed to melt out of the shadows into his hand. Hermione followed his gaze and saw strange creatures coming up the road towards them.

Three of them had one metal leg and one hairy leg that looked like one of a donkey and fiery hair. There were four large dogs with red eyes. The last was a half-man, half-bull that she knew was the minotaur, which she recognised from Greek myths. She looked back at the women with fiery hair and the giant dogs and realised once again that they were also form Greek myths, empousa and hell-hounds.

She noticed then that the other two Americans also had weapons, Percy had a sword and Annabeth had a knife.

"Annabeth, take the hell-hounds; and Nico, the empousa. I've got the minotaur," Percy said to the other two.

They all leaped forward, heading towards their assigned monsters, Hermione, Ron and Harry frozen in place. Hermione watched as Annabeth ran over to the hell-hounds and killed two in only a few seconds. Percy started battling the minotaur easily, as though he'd done it before.

Nico had gone towards the empousa, he stabbed one but then turned towards them.

When he wasn't looking, the empousa disarmed him. He bent down and placed his hand on the ground and a large crack appeared. Ten skeletons crawled out of the crack, Nico looking exhausted. The empousa defeated the skeletons pretty quickly. One of the empousa hit the Slytherin in the head and he collapsed to the ground. The empousa grabbed Nico and ran straight into the shadows.

Annabeth killed the last hell-hound and turned to Percy as he shook monster dust out of his hair.

Percy turned to where Nico had been and his face went from relief to devastation.

"NO!"

He ran over to where Nico's sword was lying on the ground and picked it. When he turned back around his face was clouded with anger. There was a dangerous glow in his dark eyes.

"What the hell just happened?" Harry cried. The Americans exchanged glances. They seemed to have a silent conversation before coming to a decision.

Percy sighed, his anger abating slightly, putting what Hermione saw was a pen lid on the tip of his sword and it shrunk down until it was just a pen. Hermione stared at it until she noticed Annabeth tucking the knife she had been using away under her jacket. Nico's sword turned into shadows then disappeared. Once they had all put their weapons away, they turned back to Hermione, Harry and Ron.

"Ummm…." Percy glanced at Annabeth for help.

"It's something to do with Greek myths, isn't it?" Hermione said. The Americans looked shocked for a moment, before recovering.

"How did you know?" said Percy. Hermione shrugged.

"I've had a few suspicions. Occasional conversations we overheard and stuff like that. The monsters were kind of a giveaway as well." The couple nodded.

"Well, those Greek stories that you call myths aren't myths. They're all real, the gods, the monsters, the heroes, everything," Annabeth explained. "The gods are based in America at the moment. Olympus is at the top of the Empire State Building, on the 600th floor."

"Wait, what do you guys have to do with this?" asked Ron.

"Well, you know how in the myths, the gods would come down from Olympus and have children with mortals, creating demigods," Annabeth continued. "They still do that, there's a whole camp full of their children."

"So, you guys are… demigods?!" cried Hermione. The two Americans nodded. The trio stared at them in shock.

"You can't tell anyone," said Annabeth. The three nodded, still in shock. There was silence as the trio tried to process what the Americans had said. Harry finally broke the silence.

"Wait, if your demigods, then who's your godly parent."

"My dad's Poseidon, god of the sea," said Percy.

"My mother is Athena, goddess of wisdom and battle strategy," Annabeth said. _Well that makes sense_ , thought Hermione. _No wonder her intellect matches mine._ "And Nico's dad is Hades, God of the Underworld."

"Wow," Ron said.

"What are you guys doing here then?" Hermione asked them.

"We came because of a quest," said Annabeth. "We were given this prophecy.

 _The greatest half-blood to ever live,_

 _Shall journey to find the boy who lived,  
Crow and owl guide the way,  
To find the place where wizards lay,  
The darkness there must not be named,  
Sons of prophecy prove its bane._

We aren't sure what all of it means yet. We guessed some of it, but prophecies aren't usually that obvious."

"That doesn't matter now," Percy said. "We have to rescue Nico." Hermione could see how worried he was for his cousin. He looked broken, like he was remembering something terrible. "What happened to him?" He looked at the Golden Trio.

"I don't know," replied Harry. "He was fighting those… things, then they knocked him out and carried him into the shadows." Annabeth frowned.

"That's weird, monsters usually just kill demigods, what do they want with him?" Annabeth's question hung in the air until Lavender and Parvati came down the road from Hogsmeade. They glanced awkwardly at the group, but moved on.

The silence continued for a few minutes after they left. Percy started pacing, mumbling things in ancient Greek. Annabeth seemed to be thinking hard, most likely trying to figure out how they'd find Nico. Harry and Ron were still kind of in shock from finding out the Americans were demigods.

"We should head back to Hogwarts," Hermione said.

"You guys can, I need to find Nico," replied Percy.

"How?"

"I don't know, I'll find a way."

"Well, without a plan, you won't get very far," said Hermione. "Once we get back to Hogwarts you can develop some kind of plan."

"Hermione's got a point," Annabeth said reluctantly. Percy turned to her. "We need a proper plan if we're gonna rescue Nico." He looked reluctant for a moment before sighing.

"Alright," said Percy. "I just don't wanna leave him with the empousa any longer than needed. I don't want a repeat of Bianca." Percy voice sounded broken. Annabeth looked at him sympathetically. Hermione wanted to ask about Bianca, _Wasn't she his cat?_ , but she decided against it upon seeing Percy's face.

"I know. Don't worry, we'll get Nico back. If they wanted to killed him they would have done it here," she said. Percy still looked worried.

"It's decided then," said Harry, already walking away, followed by Ron and Hermione, then Annabeth. Percy stayed a moment longer, reluctant to leave.

* * *

 **Harry POV**

When they got back to Hogwarts, they headed to the library, hoping to find some books that might help them save Nico. Harry was still slightly in shock from learning that the Americans were demigods. It explained all the weird things that had happened since the three came to Hogwarts. He still have so many questions that he wanted to ask them, but refrained from doing so, knowing that they would be focused on getting their friend back.

Hours passed as they searched the many shelves of books. They had found few things that could be of use to them. Eventually, Harry placed down the book he was looking through.

"We've been in here for hours and I'm getting hungry. We should head to the Great Hall for dinner," he said. The others glanced up at him.

"I agree, all this reading's made me starving," said Ron. Hermione sighed.

"Perhaps we should stop. We can continue looking tomorrow." The two demigods looked ready to argue. Hermione gave them a look and, after a moment, Annabeth sighed.

"They're right, Percy. We should go." The two had a silent argument before Annabeth appeared to win. Percy placed down his book and stood up.

"Fine."

* * *

 **Percy POV**

Percy's dreams were filled with monsters, titans, giants, all the bad things he's ever faced. Then, they all disappeared, leaving him in darkness. After a few moments, a snake-like voice came forth from the darkness.

 _You should not have gotten involved with this, half-blood. You should not have come to Hogwarts to protect Harry Potter._ It said Harry's name with disgust. _You have no business in this world, god-spawn. Had you not come, I would not have been forced to take one of your own._

 _What have you done with Nico,_ Percy cried into the blackness.

 _He is unharmed… for now. Whether he is harmed or not depends on your decision._

 _Decision?_ Percy didn't like the sound of that.

 _Yes… You have two options. Join me and you can see your friend again…_

 _Or?_

 _Or stay where you are and your friend dies…_

Percy woke with a start, the voice still echoing through his head. Elsewhere in the castle, another person woke, having witnessed the same dream…

* * *

 **I know this chapter is late and really short. Next week's will hopefully be longer.**

 _ **Reviews**_

Guest - When you did all of the prophecies, you left out the Mark of Athena! Also, please make Drarya a thing!

 _ **I left out a lot of prophecies, like all the ones from the PJO series. I only included the two Great Prophecies and the one for this quest.**_

queenlmno - NICO! NOOOOOOO! Also, finally their secret gets out! This is going to be amazing! I cant wait for more.

 _ **I know how you feel, I felt sad while writing it. Also, thank you for all your reviews, you've done like 10! I've loved reading every one of them.**_

Guest - I already posted a review here, but I forgot to mention this. I think the beginning is pretty rushed and a lot of it don't really make sense or explained. For starters, four heroes in a quest, including a person who had only experienced BARELY ONE DAY at camp. Like... how? It's already established that there are only three heroes on any given quest and exceptions to that rule are severely punished. THIS IS IMPORTANT IN THE TITAN'S CURSE. Also, Arya was barely even in CHB when she was chosen. Add that to the previous point and it all goes downhill. I'm sorry to be harsh and I know it will probably not impact ANYTHING at all, but I had to put it out there. Again, I don't mean to attack you. I only mean to help you grow. (I was the one who called Arya a Mary Sue, BTW.) Have a nice day!

 _ **The beginning was kinda rushed, I have to agree with you there. I've tried to slow down the rest of the story so it isn't as rushed. Arya had been at camp for a week when she was chosen for the quest, which was about the same amount of time that Percy was at camp in The Lightning Thief, before he went on his first quest. Next, what makes you think that all four of the demigods are gonna come back unharmed… or even alive.**_

 ****Update: I have updated all of these chapters recently and I've cut out Arya. So there's only three demigods now and Drarya obviously isn't happening. Even if Arya was still in it, Drarya wouldn't happen because I now believe that Draco is gay.**

 **Thank you everyone else for reviewing, sorry I didn't mention everyone. Please review, I love reading all of them.**

 **Anyway, see you next week.**


	13. Chapter 13

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything, yet.**

* * *

 **Nico POV**

Nico woke up to a dark forest and a splitting headache. As he slowly became aware of his surroundings, recent memories came back to him. He groaned as he remembered what happened. He gazed at the forest around him and saw a circle of monsters closing in on him. He tried to move, only to realise that he was tied up. Though there were plenty of shadows, he didn't try shadow-travelling, knowing that if he did, it could be his last time. The monsters stopped when they were a little less than ten metres away from him.

On the opposite side of the circle to Nico, the monster parted to reveal a snake-like man in dark robes coming towards him.

"Good, you have awoken. Did you enjoy your rest?" the man hissed, he didn't seem to be very good at being nice.

"Who are you and what do you want from me?" Nico said, though he suspected he knew the answer to the first question.

"You do not know who I am?" said the snake-man. Nico shrugged.

"Your the Voldy-hort guy, aren't you?" The man hissed at Nico in fury.

"It's Lord Voldemort or the Dark Lord to you."

"Whatever," Nico said, already getting bored of the conversation.

"As for what I want with you, half-blood, that depends on your friends' decisions."

"What do you mean?"

"You shall see," Voldemort replied. Nico cursed him for his vagueness. He had to find a way to escape before Voldemort could do anything.

* * *

 **Percy POV**

The next few days went by in a blur. Percy, Annabeth, Harry, Ron and Hermione spent most of their free time researching ways to rescue Nico. Percy's nightmares got worse as his worries and fears of what happened to Nico combined with his usual nightmares, as well as having Voldemort visit his dreams at least once a night to warn him that time was running out. Annabeth wasn't much better either.

The first day or so Ron, Harry and Hermione didn't ask much, but the evening after Nico was taken, they finally broke.

"Ok," Harry said suddenly, breaking the silence, "I'm sorry, I can't help it anymore: I have questions." Percy and Annabeth exchanged glances.

"Alright, go ahead," sighed Annabeth.

"You said that you're on a quest, so have you been on quests before? Are those other things that Trelawney said in Divination prophecies as well? Are they the reason for your nightmares? And your scars? Did you really go to a wizarding school in America? Or just that camp that you mentioned? Who's Chiron? Who's Will? Who's Bianca? Isn't she Nico's cat?" Harry paused from his continuous questions to take a breath. When he opened his mouth to continue, Annabeth put up a hand to stop him.

"Woah, slow down," she said, sighing. "Yes, we've been on many quests. Yes, that was the Great Prophecy and the Prophecy of the Seven, though we have had many other prophecies, those were the major ones. And yes," she swallowed, glancing at Percy, "they are the reasons for our nightmares and scars. We're not actually wizards and witches. Hecate blessed us before we came here. We go to a summer camp for demigods called Camp Half-Blood, where we can train to fight so that we can defend ourselves against monsters. Chiron is an immortal centaur who has been training demigods for thousands of years. Will is Nico's… friend. Bianca," once again, Annabeth glanced at Percy, "is Nico's sister, who he named his cat after. She… died. On our third quest." Annabeth stopped, having answered all of Harry's questions.

The trio stared at them in shock and sympathy. They didn't seem to have anything to say, which Percy was grateful for. He didn't feel like talking to them at the moment. That had ended that conversation, though the trio asked various other questions every now and then. Mainly about their quests.

Rumours had been spreading about Nico's absence, with Annabeth, Percy, Hermione, Harry and Ron trying to stifle them. To anyone who asked, they'd say that Nico had gone back to America. Umbridge seemed sceptical of their excuse, she even called them back after the first lesson without Nico to ask about it. When they told them their excuse, she got mad.

"And why was I not told of this? As High Inquisitor, I should have been told of this." They all shrugged. "I will speak to Dumbledore about this. Why did Mr di Angelo have to go back to America?"

"Urgent family matter," Annabeth answered. Umbridge turned to Percy.

"Mr Jackson, are you and Mr di Angelo not related?"

"Yeah, we're cousins. The issue is on the other side, the one I'm not related to," the son of Poseidon replied. Umbridge nodded but did not look convinced.

"When will he be back, may I ask?"

"We don't really know, it could be days or week. Hopefully, it will be within the week," replied Annabeth. Umbridge looked like she wanted to inquire further. A moment passed as she looked at the teenagers in front of her, deciding whether they were telling the truth. Eventually, she sighed and dismissed them.

They had a few more encounters like that, otherwise, they tried to avoid unwanted attention and stick to trying to figure out a way to help Nico. Though that wasn't very successful. They hadn't found anything of use, only stuff that they already knew. Percy had started to think that they would never succeed.

* * *

 **Annabeth POV**

Up in the Gryffindor common room, Annabeth was lying with her head on her boyfriend's chest while his arms were wrapped around her. They were both staring into the fire, enjoying each other's presence. Though even that couldn't calm all of the worries and doubts that existed in Annabeth's overactive brain. Her thoughts started speeding up as she thought more about it. After a few minutes of slight panic from thinking of their current situation, Percy leant down and kissed her deeply. She returned it, enjoying the feel of his lips against hers. All the thoughts that had been swirling around in her head stilled. Eventually, she pulled away, looking at him with a confused expression. He smirked.

"I was afraid if I didn't do anything, your brain would explode from all the thoughts that were going through it."

She rolled her eyes at him but sent him a grateful smile. He kissed her again and once again she returned it. When they pulled apart again, all the worries had disappeared and she felt a sense of calm settle over her.

* * *

 **Percy POV**

 _The darkness started to close around him as the Arai watched on. He knew this was the end as the pain from the curses overwhelmed him. He couldn't reach Annabeth. Just when he thought he could take no more, the pain disappeared._

 _Percy found himself in a forest, surrounded by shadows. He heard a voice in the distance and silently made his way towards it._

" _-running out of time, half-blood. I'm surprised they haven't responded yet, seems they don't care about you as much as I had thought. After I kill you, your so-called 'friends' and all of Hogwarts will be next."_

 _Percy walked into a clearing and saw a pale man in a dark cloak, who must be the owner of the voice. He barely looked like a man, as his face resembled that of a snake. He then knew who the man was: Voldemort. Then he saw who Voldemort was talking to._

 _He ran over to Nico, wishing he could help his cousin. He took in her surroundings a bit more so that he could find Nico when he woke up. The forest looked like any other forest he had been in, except this one had a lot more shadows and had a magical feel to it. As he looked closer, Percy realised that the trees that he thought were lining the clearing were actually giants. He looked around and saw that the forest was littered with monsters. He wondered why they hadn't attacked Nico yet._

" _We've faced worse threats than you. Your nothing compared to primordials and titans. We will beat you, just like we did Kronos and Gaea. You don't stand a chance. My friends will come and you will regret challenging us."_

 _Percy smiled softly at Nico's speech, knowing he was right. However, Voldemort seemed unfazed by what the son of Hades said._

" _Believe what you will, half-blood, your friends will never find you here."_

 _Nico opened his mouth to answer, but the dream faded away into darkness._

* * *

Harry, Ron and Hermione were eating breakfast in the Great Hall when Percy burst in and rushed towards them, gesturing to Annabeth to join them. The couple sat next to Harry, across from Ron and Hermione.

"I think I know where Nico is."

They all stared at him before bombarding him with questions.

"If you all shut up, I'll explain." They stopped and waited, staring intently at him. "Ok, I just had a dream," Annabeth nodded in understanding, but Harry, Hermione and Ron glanced at each other in confusion. "I was in a forest when I heard a voice, so I went towards it. I came into a clearing and saw who I assume was Voldemort talking to Nico, who was tied to a tree. After confirming he wasn't about to die, I looked at the forest more clearly. There were giants surrounding the clearing as well as hundreds of monsters throughout the forest, which had a magical feel to it. I thought that it maybe it was the Forbidden Forest."

They all listened throughout his speech. When he said the last part, Hermione frowned.

"There are barriers surrounding the school, there's no way Voldemort could get onto the school grounds: someone would have noticed if he went through the gate and he can't apparate in," she said.

"Unless he did neither." They looked at Annabeth quizzically. "Monsters can shadow-travel, which I doubt the school would be protected against. Though we can't know for sure without Nico, for now, that's our best guess. Therefore, Voldemort could have travelled alongside one of the monsters. That would explain how he got all of the monsters inside the Forbidden Forest."

"So when are we going?" Percy asked.

"Well, we still have classes for today, so we'll have to go tonight," Hermione said.

Percy groaned. "Can't we just skip class?"

"No, because we have double DADA first and Umbridge will get suspicious if we're all missing."

Percy rolled his eyes, he didn't care whether Umbridge was suspicious of them, he'd faced worse than her. He saw that Harry and Ron were having similar thoughts.

The day seemed to last 100 years as Percy waited for night to come. At last, it came. After dinner, the six teenagers, with the help of Harry's Invisibility Cloak and Annabeth's cap, arrived at the edge of the Forbidden Forest. Percy glanced around at the others and noticed that Ron looked extremely nervous. He must have felt Percy's eyes on him so he looked at Percy, who sent him an inquiring look.

"Last time we went in there, we were attacked by a colony of acromantulas. I'm not too keen on going in there again," Ron said while Annabeth paled slightly. Percy looked at his girlfriend, knowing what she was thinking. After a moment she returned to her usual colour and was replaced with a look of determination.

"Acromantulas or not, Nico's in there and we have to get him back," she said and walked into the forest while the others followed her.

* * *

They were deep in the forest when Percy felt that something was wrong. There wasn't a single sound to be heard except the faint rustling of the leaves. He felt for Riptide in his pocket and took it out. He noticed that Annabeth had her drakon-bone sword out and the followers of Hecate had their wands out.

The further they walked, the darker the forest became. Soon, it was almost pitch black, only slivers of moonlight could be seen through the canopy of trees. Eventually, it became too dark for them to see more than half a meter in front of them, so the trio each muttered a spell before the end of their wands lit up, illuminating the forest around them. They continued forward.

After what felt like hours of walking, but was probably only about ten minutes, they heard noises coming from all around them.

"Turn off the lights," Percy hissed at them. After giving him confused looks, the trio complied and the forest was once again shrouded in darkness. Percy uncapped Riptide and the faint glow of the Celestial Bronze allowed them to see clearer. That was when they saw the monsters.

* * *

 **Yes, I am still alive. And no, I haven't given up on this fanfic. It just took me a lot longer to write it than I thought. I know, I said I'd upload every two weeks, and I know that it's been months, but I've been busy with assignments and exams and… Netflix. Ok, to be honest, I probably could have spent more time writing this instead of doing other stuff. Sorry it took so long, but at least I got here in the end.**

 **As always, I hope you enjoyed this chapter, especially the cliffhanger. I'm not gonna tell you when I'll upload next because I don't know when I will. I'm on holidays so hopefully, I will have more time to write. The next chapter is coming, you just might have to wait a while.**

 **I rewrote a few of the earlier chapters and combined some of the shorter ones, which is why there are fewer chapters. I also took out my OC, Arya. Please reread these chapters, as there have been some fairly significant changes.**

 **Anyway, thank you so much for not giving up on me. Please review, I love reading them.**

 **See you… whenever I upload, which might be quite a while.**


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